As they walked out the dark hall toward the red light of the EXIT sign, Garrett looked to Landauer, who was tapping out a cigarette. “What do you think?”
Landauer grimaced. “Drama queen. Literally.” He widened his eyes like an ingénue. “ ‘The phone was ringing in the closet,’ ” he said, fluttering his hands as he mimicked Bryce’s voice. He dropped the lisp. “The phone is definitely the only thing in the closet.”
“If you’re finished—” Garrett began.
“I’m makin’ a point, here,” Landauer growled, holding up a warning finger.
“Which is?”
“Moncrief doesn’t like having a gay roommate and he hazes Tinker Bell till he leaves. Moncrief’s a musician. Sound effects: babbling voices, ringing in the closet.”
Garrett stopped and looked at his partner, who stood with the unlit cigarette in his hand. He had the strong feeling Landauer was trying to explain away something he didn’t want to look at. But we both saw it, Land: Jason’s stretched-out face and black basketball eyes. We heard that rasping, inhuman voice . . .
Garrett suddenly felt the hair on the back of his neck rise, the same absolute sensation of being watched that he’d experienced at Cauldron.
He turned sharply and stared into the dark of the hall.
They were alone, nothing in the corridor with them but the glowing red patches of the EXIT lights.
Get a grip, he told himself. Get some sleep.
Land was staring at him, and he shook his head. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe Jason was hazing him. I don’t know what to think. I think I’m too tired to think.”
“You and me both,” Landauer admitted. He looked back toward the stage with a frown. “But something’s hinky about that story and I don’t like it. I don’t like any of it.”
Outside the theater building, they saw the media had found them. Microwave-dished vans from different news stations dotted the campus, shooting atmospheric footage. Jeffs’s officers had established a no-media zone around Morris Pratt Hall, but news choppers hovered above, shooting from the air what they could not get from the ground. Garrett stood and watched as a suited reporter with a fresh haircut and a mike chased down a couple of backpacked students. Everyone in the continental U.S. knows Jason Moncrief killed her, by now. Signed, sealed, delivered.
The partners met Lingg and Jenna in the parking lot at the side of the dorm, where they were processing Moncrief’s car, a black late-model Mustang hardtop convertible. The kid was no pauper.
Lingg turned away from the car with a grin. “Happy New Year, Detectives. We found Erin’s phone. Under the passenger seat. And more semen and blood traces in the back.”
Slam dunk.
In his oddly maternal way, Lingg suggested that Jenna drive the Cavalier back to Boston so Garrett and Landauer could catch an hour’s nap in the CSU van, and the partners gratefully accepted, each taking a piece of the floor in the back. Garrett folded his suit coat under his head and lay back with his eyes shut. He was nearly dead, yet his mind was racing, cataloguing.
• An eyewitness putting Erin and Jason together mere hours before her murder
• Blood and semen on Jason’s jeans
• The ceremonial objects under his bed, including a dagger like—if not identical to—the one that killed her
• Erin’s phone in Jason’s car
• Blood and semen in Jason’s car
• The leather book with its ominous and incriminating symbols
• Eyewitness testimony that Jason was disturbed and disturbing
At this rate the lab would find traces of Erin’s blood on the dagger, Moncrief would give them a full, voluntary confession and agree to a plea, and they’d be closing the book on this one within the week. A dream case. All the glory and none of the hassle. And what was so wrong about that?
“There is no grace, there is no guilt . . .”
Garrett spoke aloud to his partner from where he stretched on the floor of the van. “I was wrong. You were right. It’s the kid.”
For a moment he thought Landauer was already asleep. Then his voice came, disembodied, from the other side of the van. “This is a weird one. It baffles the fuck out of me.”
Garrett said slowly, “Yeah.”
And then they were out.
Chapter Thirteen
The nap was lifesaving, and both detectives were able to shower and change into spare clothes in the locker room of Schroeder before once again convening in the conference room with Malloy and Carolyn. Normally Malloy would not have shown hide nor hair on a Sunday, his church day, but apparently the Carmody name trumped God, and of course time was of the essence.
As Garrett began to list the evidence, he knew they had the charges nailed just by watching Carolyn’s and Malloy’s faces.
“The DJ at Cauldron puts Erin and Jason together just hours before her death. Erin’s roommate says Jason was obsessed with her and was out with her that night. Erin’s missing cell phone was found in Jason’s car. We have a pair of jeans taken from Jason’s room which have traces of blood and semen that we believe DNA tests will match to Erin and Jason, confirming they had sex that night, and there are similar traces in Jason’s car. We have a CD from Jason’s band that contains the symbols and numbers that were carved into Erin’s torso. We have three student witnesses willing to testify to Jason’s unbalanced mental state. And we have a whole collection of occult ritual objects from a lockbox under Moncrief’s bed, including a dagger like the one used to kill Erin. It’s being tested for blood residue right now. The rest of it—well, none of it looks good.” He passed out photos of the ceremonial objects.
The silence was electric as Carolyn and Malloy looked over the photos. Garrett and Landauer held each other’s eyes over the table.
“This is very strong,” Carolyn declared, looking up. Her face was shining. “Very strong. We should have zero trouble getting a grand jury to hand down an indictment. When will we have DNA results?”
Garrett was the complete professional as he answered her. “The lab will be able to tell us unofficially within two days. The full report will take a couple of weeks because of corroborative tests. But we can match blood type, and the semen taken from Erin’s body was from a secretor, so we have the blood type on that as well.”
“That’ll work,” she said, writing. “How soon can you get me a charging package?” She looked to Malloy, and Malloy raised his eyebrows at the detectives.
Garrett and Landauer looked at each other, calculating. A charging package was a daunting document: a presentation of all the evidence, lab reports, witness testimony, photos, and evidence lists that the DA’s office needed to file charges. It would also be used in negotiations with Moncrief’s attorney, to show them how strong the case was and apply pressure for a plea. The partners were painfully light on sleep to begin with, but the nap in the CSU van and the shower had helped.
Landauer was already thinking out loud. “All the lab tests have been expedited. We should be getting results throughout the evening—print matches from the car, the blood screens . . .”
Garrett added, “The phone records will take a while, but we’ve got the call logs from the cell phones, and the IT guys should be able to open the computer files on both laptops . . .” Then he frowned. “I’d like to be able to talk to the other band members, too.”
“Do you really need those witness accounts to make a preliminary case?” Malloy interrupted, with an edge.
Garrett weighed it, conceded, “Probably not. But, Lieutenant, if we could get in to see Moncrief tonight, we might just be able to get the whole thing out of him. Especially with the stuff we found under the bed—”
“It’s not going to happen,” Carolyn said. “Moncrief’s family has hired Merrill James.”
There was no need for her to elaborate. James was one of the two top defense attorneys in the state, a celebrity lawyer for celebrity cases.
“Obviously they know we’re going to be charging Moncrief with Erin
’s murder,” Carolyn continued. “James has already gotten a technical restraining order stating that no law enforcement official can question Moncrief unless James is present. And James hasn’t been returning calls today—I’ve tried.”
They all sat, absorbing this news.
Malloy narrowed his eyes toward the detectives. “We have twenty-eight hours left on the initial forty-eight-hour hold for the assault on a peace officer arrest. Can we get a charging package together in time to arrest him again for Erin Carmody’s murder before he’s released on bail?” His voice seemed curtly challenging, but then again, it always did.
“We can do it,” Garrett said.
“You got it,” Landauer agreed.
“There’s another thing, and this is important.” Carolyn put her manicured hands flat on the table. “The office has directed me to go for a no-bail hold, and of course I agree. So we need the charging document to reflect that Moncrief is either a flight risk or a danger to the community, preferably both.” She nodded toward Landauer. “Now, the attack on Detective Landauer goes a long way toward ‘danger to the community,’ but can you build from there?”
Garrett felt a wave of fatigue, and forced himself to focus. “Flight risk, I don’t know,” he said slowly. “We didn’t get anything from anyone we talked to that would make a case for it. Erin’s roommate Shelley Forbes will testify that she felt threatened by Moncrief, and so will Moncrief’s ex-roommate, Bryce Brissell, but he’s not the most credible witness.”
“Anything that goes to premeditation would help. E-mails, threats,” Carolyn said encouragingly. “See what you can put together. I’ll start on my end with these notes so far, and fax me what you’ve got as lab results come in. I’m totally available to you,” she finished, looking at Garrett without a hint of double entendre.
Malloy pushed back in his chair. “I’ve called in a couple of typists to transcribe tapes and reports. They’ll be at your disposal for as long as you need them,” he said, but he avoided eye contact with Garrett as he said it. “I want this done.”
Chapter Fourteen
As the partners spread their reports and notes and tapes out over the long table in the back of the detectives’ bureau, the reality of the mountain of work they had ahead of them sank in. Since their arrival at the landfill yesterday morning, they had worked the case nonstop, without enough of a break even to do more than file the most preliminary notes in the murder book. They were starting from scratch.
They began by setting up the two typists Malloy had provided (not for the detectives’ convenience, Garrett knew well enough) with the witness interview tapes to transcribe.
Back at the long table of files, Garrett looked over the clear plastic evidence crates and spotted the maroon leather-bound book in a top crate.
He reached for a box of latex gloves and slipped a pair on to take the book from the crate, then sat at the table with it. It was heavy, the blood-colored leather soft to the touch.
He opened the cover of the book. The pages were fibery, document quality, giving the volume an antique feel, and the writing was completely hand-blocked, in black calligraphy pen—and completely incomprehensible: a twiglike alphabet that looked vaguely familiar, but was no language that Garrett could name.
Garrett carefully turned the pages with gloved hands. Amid the writing there were drawings as well, including sketches of pentagrams . . . and on later pages, the number 333 and the triple triangle design that had been carved into Erin Carmody’s torso.
He spoke aloud to Landauer. “He’s got those triangles and 333 in this book, too, but the writing’s in some kind of code.” Landauer glanced up from the witness report he was detailing, stood, and came around the table to look.
“Is that a language?” Garrett asked him.
Landauer frowned down at the stick letters on the page. “It looks familiar, but I can’t place it.”
Garrett sat back against his chair, in a fog of sleeplessness. The logo he’d seen on Moncrief’s laptop screen ran through his head again, like a mad chant:
There is no grace, there is no guilt. This is the Law: DO WHAT THOU WILT!
He was suddenly aware of the weight of the book in his hands. The thick pages, the look of the lettering, the whole feel of it—all made him profoundly uncomfortable. He realized that even with latex gloves on, he had no desire to be touching it.
He shoved back his chair and stood. “I’m going over to the lab to see if they can translate this thing.”
Landauer nodded distractedly, already moving back to his witness reports. “Get an ETA on the prints and blood.”
The crime lab was a short walk down a connecting corridor that overlooked the dim and sickly lights of the Lower Roxbury hood. Garrett brooded on the notion of premeditation as he walked with the heavy book. The volume had an odd feeling in his hands that he couldn’t identify but which he didn’t like, a sense almost of malevolence. That, of course, was nonsense. But what if Jason had plotted Erin’s death in the book? If he had written anything down, that would go to premeditation.
Garrett walked faster, and turned in through the door of the lab.
“Hello, young Garrett! Thanks for the OT!” A cheery voice called out from a desk as Garrett stepped through the gate at the counter.
Criminalist Warren Tufts was a veteran, nearing seventy but wiry and spry and perpetually delighted with his job. He tipped precariously back in his swivel chair and eyed the book in Garrett’s hands. “Bearing gifts, I see. What new treasure do you have for us this fine evening?”
“I was hoping you could tell me. It’s the suspect’s, but it’s in some kind of code.” Garrett opened the book randomly on Tuft’s desk. “Need to get it translated.”
Tufts scowled down at the twiglike letters. “I’m no good with code. It’s all Greek to me! Henderson’s in Alaska. I’ll have to outsource this. There’s a guy at MIT we use. Is it a rush?”
Garrett paused. It was as far as he was concerned. “Yes,” he decided. As he handed over the book, he felt a strange reluctance to part with it. “And can you make a copy for me? I’d like to take a look through myself, tonight.”
“Right you are.” As Tufts got up and moved toward the file room, Garrett looked over the rows of steel counters at the back of the lab. Two counters were crowded with individually bagged pieces of trash, and Garrett recognized the refuse taken from the landfill. He frowned, remembering something.
“Hey, Tufts. We took some burned flowers from the landfill. Did you get anything on those?”
The criminalist stuck his head out the file room doorway. “Don’t think they’ve been processed yet. Burned flowers?”
“Yeah. Scorched.”
“What’ve they got to do with all this?”
“I don’t know,” Garrett said, and shook his head. “I don’t have a clue.”
Twenty minutes later he was back in the homicide room, with a thick pile of photocopied pages and the original book. He’d prevailed on Tufts to make a second copy so he could take the original with him in case he needed it—for what, he had no particular sense, only that it could be important.
Landauer sat at the long table, hunched over a laptop, a stack of reports in front of him. He looked up at Garrett with a glazed look in his eyes. They both contemplated the piles of files and random pages stacked all over the table. A thick silence fell.
Garrett cleared his throat. “I’m thinking my place. Order porterhouse and Caesars from Dino’s. Eat, write, nap. Eat, write, nap.”
Landauer exhaled. “I am so with you, Rhett.” They both reached out and started packing boxes of documents.
Garrett’s house, north of Logan Airport, was the house he’d grown up in, his parents’ house, in a crowded lower middle-class neighborhood that had gentrified in the precrash housing boom. Garrett was the fifth son in an Irish Catholic family, the late-in-life mistake, conceived when his mother was forty-nine and his father fifty-five. Garrett was ten years younger than the next youngest of his
brothers, who had always been more like uncles to him than siblings, and he guessed he could thank the papal ban on contraception for his very existence, but with what he saw daily as a cop he was the most fervent advocate of birth control he knew. If there was a way to put it in the water he would vote for it, no questions asked.
His parents were dead, now; his father from complications from alcoholism just over four years ago, and his mother simply followed in her sleep a mere three months after. Some people would call that love.
Garrett’s brothers and their families were long gone out of state: New Hampshire, Connecticut, Maine—and rebel Paulie to Fort Lauderdale. Garrett had inherited the house, and after the obligatory mourning period he’d slowly rehabbed the place, discarding furniture untouched since the sixties and revealing clean lines and antique moldings and gorgeous hardwood floors under his mother’s wallpaper and fussy Irish lace and religious bric-a-brac.
Just having his own walls around him now was rejuvenating. The delivered meal and another round of showers had energized both detectives, and three hours into it they had made real headway on the charging document, using the murder book and their notes from Amherst to draw up a complete chronology and fill in about a third of the reports they needed. Tufts called in with another nail in Jason Moncrief’s coffin: some of the fingerprints in Moncrief’s Mustang were a match for Erin’s. However, the lab had found no blood residue on the dagger they had taken from Moncrief’s room.
The partners took a break for cannoli and channel-surfed through the news. The stations were falling all over themselves to profile Jason: rich kid, young mother, older father high ranking in the navy. Young mother did very well in the divorce and had husband-hopped ever since, every time doing better, while Jason was shuffled from private school to military school, his behavior deteriorating with each successive transfer.
Book of Shadows Page 9
