“We still need to check out DeLong,” Mac reminded him.
“Right. No reason we can’t do that this afternoon. Let’s pay him a cold call too. Did you get his address?”
Mac held up his notebook. “Right here.”
Eric hung up. “The sergeant will take the watch until ten o’clock tonight then turn it over to a graveyard troop. I told him to plan on sticking a day-shifter on the apartment tomorrow as well.”
“What did he say to that?” Kevin asked.
“He grumbled a little; I guess he’s pretty thin on patrols.” He frowned. “Aren’t we all? Speaking of which—this case has us all spread pretty thin. I think I’ll make a quick run down to the Pen tomorrow and see if Wallace has made any phone calls.” He glanced over at Kevin. “Are you and Mac going to the funeral?”
“I’m not sure. Philly and Russ can handle things there. If we don’t hear from Joe on that polygraph by tomorrow morning, we’ll need to pay him another visit.” His cheeks puffed out as he exhaled long and hard. “I’m almost afraid to start looking into what this DeLong guy has been up to. Gives me the creeps just thinking about what he’s been doing. So far every rock we’ve turned over has been covered with scum.”
Mac and the others agreed.
“Who knows?” Kevin snapped his briefcase shut. “Maybe the blood in Joe’s old apartment will be Megan’s. It wouldn’t hurt my feelings at all to put that guy back in lockup.”
Mac picked up his briefcase and headed for the door. “Come on, slowpoke,” he said to Kevin. “It’s time to rumble.”
“Say, Mac. Hold on a second.” Eric slipped a small square envelope out of his jacket pocket and, leaning across the table, handed it to Mac. “Lynn wanted me to give this to you. I told her I could just ask, but she doesn’t trust me to remember.”
“What?”
“It’s just an invite to dinner on Sunday after church.” He grinned. “Hope you can make it.”
“Hey, not fair.” Philly pouted. “I’ve worked with you a lot longer than Mac, and you never invited me for dinner.”
“That’s because I’d go broke buying enough food to feed you.”
He chuckled. “Besides, Mac’s family.”
“Oh, right,” Philly said. “I’d forgotten about that. Mac, if you do end up going, just don’t let Eric do any of the cooking. At our picnic last month he dropped one of the steaks on the ground, picked it up, brushed off the dirt with his oven mitt, and tossed it back on the grill.”
Kevin laughed. “What Philly doesn’t know is, that was the steak he got.”
Philly tossed his pen across the room. Kevin ducked and it hit the wall. “Time to go, Mac. The natives are getting restless.”
MAC AND KEVIN found DeLong’s address without any problem. They rang the bell and a woman in her thirties answered. They introduced themselves. “We’d like to talk with Matthew DeLong. Is he in?”
“Um . . . he has to work tonight and he’s just stepped out of the shower.”
“Who is it?” a guy yelled from the back of the house.
“Detectives, from the Oregon State Police.”
There was a pause before he shouted, “Just a minute.”
The woman left them at the door and went back into the kitchen, where she was apparently cooking something for dinner. The delicious scent wafted out to them, making Mac’s stomach growl.
Several long minutes went by while the detectives listened to a lawn mower, birds singing, someone starting a vehicle and revving it up. A horn honked.
“Um, ma’am,” Kevin finally leaned in and knocked on the open door. “Could you see what’s keeping your husband?”
“He isn’t my husband. He’s my brother.” She came out of the kitchen looking none too pleased by the interruption. Wiping her hands on a dishtowel, she walked down the hallway to the last room on the left and knocked. “Matthew, get your sorry butt out here; the cops are still waiting.”
There was no answer. She pushed open the door and came back toward the two detectives. Holding her hands out, she shrugged. “I’m sorry. He’s gone.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Mac charged into the bedroom, with Kevin close behind. The bedroom window was wide open. Mac started to climb through it, but Kevin stopped him. “No point in chasing after him. He’s got too much of a head start. Besides, he’s not under arrest and it’s not illegal to run from us. I’ll put a call into Eric for some manpower. In the meantime let’s talk to the sister—find out if he took his car, where he might go, what he’s been doing, and why he felt he had to run.”
“You think this is our guy?” Mac scanned the backyard and moved back inside.
“I don’t know, but we sure as heck are going to find out. He’s got something to hide; that’s for sure.”
“Is Matthew in some sort of trouble again?” The sister was standing in the doorway.
Tears had gathered in her eyes, but they didn’t match the annoyance on her features. “What has that fool brother of mine done this time?”
“We don’t know that he’s done anything,” Kevin said. “What was your name?”
“Sandra. Sandra Keeley.”
Kevin nodded. “We just wanted to talk to him about a case we’re working on.”
“What case is that?”
“Did he ever mention a woman named Megan Tyson?”
Sandra paled. “Oh, my gosh. You don’t think he . . .”
“No, ma’am. We’re interviewing people who knew her. Your brother met her at the Mountain View Retirement Inn.”
“He never mentioned her.” Sandra’s fists tightened around the towel she still held.
“Do you have any idea why he might take off like that?”
“He’s been in trouble before. I suppose he just got scared. He promised me he’d get his life back in order. Um . . . Matthew has had a really tough time of it. He’s undergone counseling as a condition of his last release from jail. We—my husband and I— told him he could stay as long as he didn’t get into any more trouble.”
While Kevin questioned her, Mac scanned the bedroom. A television sat atop a modern-looking chest of drawers. The furniture was a mismatch—some looking like Goodwill rejects. A fairly new computer sat on one of those single units about the size of a bookcase that held the desktop and all the peripheral items, a printer, scanner, fax machine, CDs, and disks. Though crowded, the room looked neat and orderly. His gaze settled back on the TV, a Sony—hadn’t Cindy listed one as a stolen item? He made a mental note to check it out.
“Do you know why your brother stopped working at the retirement inn?” Kevin asked.
“They fired him. Had some complaints from some of the residents. He didn’t seem too upset about that. Didn’t like working there anyway.”
“You mentioned he was going to work. Where does he work now?”
“He’s a waiter out at Donovan’s Bar & Grill—near Vancouver Mall. Actually they changed the name to Westfield, but I never call it that. It’s a temporary job—so was the one at the retirement inn. He’s into computers and hopes to get a job with Hewlett Packard.”
“Do you have any idea where he might have gone just now?”
She shook her head. “Probably not to work.”
Kevin agreed. “Probably not. Since we didn’t see a vehicle back out of your driveway, can I assume he left on foot?”
“We can check.” They followed her back down the hall and into the main part of the house, veering off to the right. “He parks his motorcycle out back beside the garage.” She went to the patio door just off the dining room and peered out. “His bike’s gone.”
“Great.” Mac grunted, angry with himself for being outwitted by the ex-con. The vehicle he’d heard above the lawn mower must have been DeLong’s.
Sandra glanced at the clock on the stove. “I’m sorry. I wish I could help you more, but I have to finish dinner before my son comes back from the pool.”
“We won’t keep you. If Matthew contacts you, could y
ou let us know?” Kevin handed her a card with his number on it. “As of now, we only want to talk to him. Mac, did you have anything?”
“Just one question. I notice your brother had a Sony television set in his room. Do you know where he got it?”
“Um . . . from a friend, I think. He brought it home a couple of weeks ago.” Sandra set the card on the counter near a wall phone.
“I’m sorry he took off.”
“It’s not your fault. We may need to come back and talk with you later—maybe have a look through his things.”
“You know, he has been worried about the child support situation. His ex-wife is really vindictive. Maybe he was afraid you were going to get him for back child support.”
Kevin nodded. “Well, you can tell him that’s not what we’re here about.”
“I will—if I see him. I have a few other things to tell him too.”
She walked them to the door.
On his way back to the car, Mac was lost in thought, wondering what DeLong was up to. He had a bad feeling about this guy.
“Top of the list is getting crowded.” Kevin adjusted the vents so the air was blowing full force into his face. He lowered the window and rested his arm on the sill.
“You can say that again. Want to drive around and see if we can spot him?”
“No. Like I said, we’ll turn it over to the uniforms and let them find him. Or we can wait awhile. I have a hunch he’ll talk to the sister before long. Good call on the television set. I can’t wait to find out what he has to say about that. I’ll get a search warrant going, and with or without DeLong’s presence, we’ll check that room and maybe even the house thoroughly.” He yawned. “In the meantime, we should call it a day. I could use some sleep and I’d like some time to go over our findings and pray about our next step.”
“Seems like you do a lot of praying.”
“I do, Mac. You might try it. Gives me peace of mind, knowing the Lord is working right alongside us.”
Gives me the creeps. Mac kept the thought to himself. He liked Kevin, respected him more every day. If the guy felt praying helped, he wasn’t going to argue.
Mac didn’t want to go home. He didn’t want to talk to Linda about getting married. He wanted to put Megan’s killer behind bars. After dropping Kevin off at his car in the P.D. parking lot, Mac began his trek west, then north over the bridge into Vancouver. He hardly noticed the mountains or the clear blue sky. All he could think about was Megan. Had one of the guys they’d uncovered been her killer? He wanted things to move faster— much faster.
On the way home he stopped for takeout at a Thai place and ordered salad, rolls, and some kind of chicken dish he couldn’t pronounce—pieces of chicken yellowed and spiced by curry and served with vegetables and rice.
At home he checked the answering machine. There were six messages from Linda. In all of them she needed to talk to him right away. Something about an appointment she’d made for them on Thursday night for premarital counseling. Premarital counseling?
What was that all about? He had a feeling it had to do with his less-than-perfect attitude toward church and God.
Annoyed and curious, he dialed her number but hung up when he got her answering machine. He’d try later, but chances were, she’d call him back before he got a chance.
Mac took the information they had gathered so far on Megan’s case out of his briefcase and set it on the table. While he ate, he went back through all of the suspects: Gordon Reed, Joe Higgins, Mitch Wallace, Matthew DeLong, Brandon King and his pals.
The fiancé had slipped through the polygraph exam, but Mac wasn’t totally ready to dismiss him either.
Mac rubbed his forehead. What had Megan seen in these guys? Why would she date them? Tim Morris he could understand, but the others? Megan, where was your common sense?
Maybe more important, what reason would any of them have to kill her? Jealousy was a strong motive. Gordon and Tim fell into that category. Maybe Matthew DeLong did as well, but Mac suspected his motive, along with Joe’s, would be rejection. Dottie had mentioned an argument between Matthew and Megan. With Joe Higgins, the motive may have been the jewelry. It fit—the fact that he made jewelry; he had probably seen the necklace and the ring. But Megan’s death had been so brutal, denoting passion and anger—the kind of anger that rose out of jealousy and rejection, not theft. If it were up to him, with the evidence and information he had now, he’d finger Matthew DeLong. Unfortunately, they didn’t have enough evidence for a conviction.
The closest thing they had to solid evidence in the case was that bloodstain. It would sure help if they could find the cross and the ring—and those missing items from her apartment. Had the television set he’d seen in Matthew’s room been Megan’s? Every day brought new trails to follow and more to think about. His head swam with possibilities. Somehow they had to narrow this thing down.
You could pray about it. The thought came out of nowhere, blindsiding him.
Leaning back in his chair, Mac thought about Kevin and what he’d said about prayer. His grandmothers had often told him that God answered prayers. He wondered if Megan had prayed during her ordeal. She’d been a minister’s daughter. I bet you did.
Humph. Cynicism invaded his thoughts. God didn’t answer those prayers, did He?
Despite his feelings about God, Mac did pray. “I don’t know what to believe anymore. But if You are there and You are listening, please help us narrow our search and find Megan’s killer. She didn’t deserve to die like that.”
He thought about Linda and his uncertainty in that relationship. “And while You’re at it, maybe You could help me figure out if Linda is the girl I should be marrying.”
The phone both startled and embarrassed him. “Hey, Mac.” The woman’s voice sounded familiar, but he couldn’t place it.
“Yeah. What can I do for you?”
“It’s Dana Bennett.”
“Dana.” He grinned, imagining Dana’s dimpled smile. “How are you doing?”
“Good. Um . . . I was wondering—if it’s a bad time I can call later . . .”
“No. It’s fine. I was just eating some takeout.”
“Okay, well, I’d like to talk to you about something. About your work actually. Would you mind if I came over?”
“Please do. I could use some company.”
“Okay. I’ll be there in about fifteen, twenty minutes.”
Dana lived in Gresham, not far off I-84. He doubted it would take her that long. Mac finished eating and cleared the table, putting away his notes and paperwork. His place wasn’t all that messy— mainly because he had hardly lived there lately and because he kept a clean house. He attributed his housekeeping to his grandmothers, especially Kathryn, who had made certain he knew that being male didn’t exclude him from housecleaning chores.
When the doorbell rang, a jolt of excitement tore though him.
He felt like a kid with a new toy. Not a good analogy.
“Come on in.”
“Thanks.” Dana grinned up at him shyly and he wondered if the visit was just to ask questions.
“Have a seat.” Mac gestured toward the living room. “Can I get you anything?”
“No thanks, I’m fine.” She chewed on her lower lip. “I feel kind of awkward coming here.”
“Hey, no reason to. We’re old buds right?” There was that grin again, and blue eyes you could drown in. You’re engaged, he reminded himself. Remember Linda?
“Right. Which is why I called you. Might as well get to the point here. Mac, I want to be a detective.”
Mac’s gaze drifted over her face and her trim figure, nicely covered with a pale blue blouse and tight jeans. His gaze jerked back to her face. “You what?”
“I want to be a detective. I know I’m new on the job, but I really want to be a homicide detective. I need you to tell me what all to do and maybe put in a good word with your bosses.”
Mac paused, collecting his thoughts. “It’s no secret. Basic
ally, you need to show them you can do a good job on the road, you know, digging beyond the ticket. You have to make the cases, and that involves looking past license plates to get to the real dirt.
Make the arrests and bring the bad guys in. And keep doing what you’re doing—show up at the crime scenes, offer to help. Put in free hours. That’s what I did—worked a lot of gratis shifts because I wanted the experience.”
“That I can do.” Dana leaned back and crossed her arms. “I need someone to sponsor me or I’ll never make it. Who’s that gonna be if not you? Philly?”
Mac grinned. “I don’t think Philly is your guy. Kevin might be, though. Just keep doing what you’re doing. The most important thing is being able to back up your arrests with good reports. That keeps you out of court and keeps the sergeant happy.”
“Can I show you some of my reports before I turn them in for review? You know, have you look them over and give me some pointers?”
Mac shrugged, thinking he’d do just about anything for the cute trooper sitting across the coffee table from him. “Sure. Just throw them in my box or drop by. You could also help yourself by signing up for as much training as you can get. Even if they turn you down, and they might for a while, be persistent and make sure you spell this out on your annual employee development form during your evaluation. Always put your goals on paper in case your sergeant is reassigned so the new guy knows what ground you’ve covered.”
“I’m way ahead of you there, Mac. The sarge is very aware of my goals.” Dana grinned.
“Sounds like you’ve already done a lot of the groundwork. Let Sergeant Evans know you want to transfer in and wait for an opening.”
“Do you think I can do it?”
“I don’t know why not. The unit I’m in doesn’t have any women—at least none that I’ve met. There’s Melissa Thomas out of the Salem office who’s the polygraph examiner. She might be a good one to talk to. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll be able to work together.”
“Now, that would be a plus. I’m not sure how my boyfriend would feel about me having a guy as good-looking as you for a partner, though.”
Secrets, Lies & Alibis Page 26
