by Allen Eskens
“She was having an affair?”
“It’s possible. There was this one night that Toke showed up at my home looking for Jeannie. I got the impression that he thought she was still at the office. I hemmed and hawed until he let the cat out of the bag. He said that Jeannie told him that she was working late, but the office was already closed for the day. I kept my response simple and evasive, telling him that she had been working a lot lately. I told him that I had gone home early because of a headache, and that I didn’t know when Jeannie left. That wasn’t true. Jeannie left early that day.”
“Did Toke figure it out?”
“I don’t know. Like I said, I didn’t pry. When Jeannie came in the next morning, I told her about Toke’s visit. She didn’t react one way or another to that news, but after that, she went back to being the old Jeannie, the one who didn’t sing at her desk.”
“She ended her affair.”
“That’d be a reasonable conclusion.”
“Do you have any idea who the affair was with?”
“No. But I might be able to figure it out. I have a program on my phones to record the number for all outgoing calls, even local ones. I use it to bill clients accurately. I never throw those records away, in case anyone wants to dispute my bill. I’m kind of a pack rat that way.”
Bob stands and walks to a small door just outside of his office, disappearing down a staircase into the basement. I wait, listening to the clock on the wall tick away the minutes—twelve of them in all—before he returns. In his hand he carries a yellow folder, and he is reading from the pages of that folder as he sits down.
“These are calls made from Jeannie’s phone nine months before Angel was born.” He studies the page, and I watch as a glimmer of recognition grows on his face. “There’s one number here—she was talking to this person multiple times a day and for twenty and thirty minutes at a shot. I had no idea.”
“Who is it?”
“I don’t recognize the number, but we can call it and find out.”
“Use star-six-seven so they can’t see who’s calling.”
“Good idea.” Bob hits the speaker button on his desk phone and dials. We look at each other as it rings once, twice, then—click.
“Jeb Lewis here.”
Bob hangs up.
Chapter 41
After we put together a plan, Bob and I leave his office together, heading toward the courthouse square. I break away as we pass the Sheriff’s Office, and Bob continues on, limping his way up the granite steps of the courthouse to see the county attorney. His part of our plan is to sit in that office until they give him the evidence in Moody’s case.
I walk into the Sheriff’s Office and ask to see Kimball. At first the receptionist tells me that he’s too busy to see me.
“Tell Sheriff Kimball that I have new evidence that he needs to know about. Tell him that I have proof that his investigation is tainted. He needs to see me.”
She rolls her eyes, picks up the phone, and speaks a few words, her irritated expression never softening. A minute later, Sheriff Kimball appears at the door.
“This had better be good. I’m busy.”
“Is there someplace we can talk in private?”
Kimball looks disgusted and shakes his head, but leads me to the conference room. “Now what’s this all about?” he says.
I look at the camera in the corner of the ceiling. “Is Jeb listening?”
“No, Jeb’s out on a call, so you’ll have to talk to me.”
“You’re the one I want to talk to. I think you arrested the wrong man.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake.”
“Just hear me out,” I say. “I know you and Nathan don’t want to believe a word that Moody Lynch says.”
“Is that what this is about?” Kimball stands up and starts for the door. “You’re wasting my time.”
“No, that’s not what this is about.” I raise my hands in a stay-put gesture. “I have new information, and it explains some of the problems in Moody’s statement.”
Kimball crosses his arms and stands by the door. “Fine, let’s hear it.”
“Moody said that when he got to the barn, he found Angel on the ground—groggy, like she’d already taken the pills. But Jeb said that he found her in the house. That doesn’t make sense. So naturally, you assume that Moody was lying about seeing Angel there.”
“Of course he was lying. She was unconscious when Jeb found her in her bed.”
“But what if Jeb is the one who is lying?”
Kimball’s demeanor drops from irritated to threatening. “Boy, you had better tread lightly.”
“What if Jeb Lewis had an affair with Jeannie Talbert?”
That little bomb does less to chip away at Kimball’s anger than I expect, but I can see fissures beginning to form. He narrows his stare and walks to the table to sit. “I’m not big on town gossip, son. If you have something, you’d better be sure of it.”
“Toke Talbert had a vasectomy,” I say. “After my mother got pregnant with me, Toke went ape-shit and had a vasectomy. He did it so that no woman could ever try to trap him again.”
“You have proof of this?”
“I have my mother’s word, but it should be easy enough to verify. I assume you still have Toke’s body on ice somewhere. If he couldn’t sire another child, then Angel isn’t his daughter.”
“How, exactly, do you make the leap from that to Jeb having an affair with Jeannie?”
“They were high-school sweethearts. You knew about that, right?”
“High school was a long time ago.”
“Jeannie used to work for Bob Mullen. Bob keeps track of calls made from his office. He said that in the months just before Jeannie got pregnant, there were a ton of calls made to one particular number—Jeb’s number.”
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“No, Sheriff, it doesn’t prove anything, but if it’s true, that means that one of the investigators in Toke’s murder had a motive himself to kill Toke.”
Kimball swallows hard, and I watch his eyes move back and forth, as though connecting dots in his mind. Then he picks up the phone and hits three numbers. “Shirley? Is Jeb still out on that domestic?” Pause. “Is Nathan in the office?” Pause. “Have Nathan join me in the interview room, and tell him to bring the Talbert case with him, please.”
Kimball rubs the stubble on his chin and lets out a heavy sigh as we wait. The door opens, and Deputy Calder walks in carrying a box, putting it on a chair beside Kimball. Kimball pulls a folder from the box and starts thumbing through it. “Nathan, I have a question to ask you, and I need the absolute truth. I know you and Jeb are close, but this is important.”
Calder eases into a chair next to Kimball.
“Nathan, do you know anything about Jeb having an affair with Jeannie Talbert?”
Calder turns a dark shade of pink when he hears the question. He looks at me, and then back at Kimball, his jaw slackened, his eyes probably trying to read our faces, hoping to find some hint of explanation. “I’m not sure.”
Kimball looks up from the file. “What do you mean, you’re not sure?” Kimball says. “Either you know something or you don’t.”
“It was a long time ago. I remember there was a span of a few months when Jeb was asking me to cover for him. You know, pick up a call here and there and not ask questions. I don’t know how to explain it exactly―it just seemed strange. I thought…maybe, you know? But I never knew for sure.”
Kimball shakes his head. “Well, shit.” He pulls a second file folder from the box, and I can see that it is the autopsy report. He starts flipping through it.
“What’s this all about?” Nathan asks.
“Little Toke here thinks he has proof that Jeb and Jeannie were having an affair.”
“So what?” Nathan asks. “What’s that got to do with the price of tea?”
Kimball ignores Calder and continues reading the report. “This strange activity you noticed, w
ould that have been around the time just before Jeannie got pregnant?”
Nathan straightens up. “I don’t remember. It was a long time ago. Like I said—”
Kimball holds up a finger to stop Nathan, his attention aimed at the file in his hand. Kimball goes back to the previous file, which I can now see has Angel’s name on the lip. He picks up the phone and pushes three buttons again. “Shirley, could you dig up Jeannie Talbert’s suicide file and bring it here?”
“What is it, Sheriff?” Nathan asks.
“Probably nothing, but we may have a problem. You see, Little Toke also—”
“Don’t call me that,” I say. “My name is Joe.” My tone yanks Kimball’s attention away from his reading, but only for a moment. Then he shrugs and returns to his thought.
“Joe has reason to believe that Toke had a vasectomy.” Kimball waits for Nathan to see the link. “Toke might not be Angel’s father.”
“You think Jeb might be…” Nathan says.
I ask Nathan, “How many times has Jeb gone to Mankato to visit Angel?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“How many?” Kimball repeats.
Nathan looks humble when he answers. “About every other day.”
“Does his wife know that?” Kimball asks.
“He told me to keep it between us.”
The receptionist walks in, hands a file to Kimball, and leaves.
I say, “Does that sound like the actions of a concerned deputy or a concerned father?”
“Aw, Jesus Christ,” Kimball blurts out. He has a look on his face like a man who just caught his son shooting heroin. He throws Jeannie’s suicide file onto the table.
“What is it?” Nathan asks.
“Toke Talbert’s blood type is O negative. Jeannie was B.” He looks at Nathan. “According to Angel’s medical report, she’s AB.”
Nathan doesn’t respond.
“Damn it, Nathan, they lectured about this at the blood seminar we went to last year. Weren’t you paying attention?”
Nathan shrugs his confusion.
“An O and a B cannot give birth to anything with an A in it.” Kimball looks defeated as he speaks. “Toke can’t be Angel’s father. It’s medically impossible.”
“And you think that Jeb…” Nathan starts.
Kimball props his elbows on the table and raises his hands to massage his temples. “Let’s look at this and assume two things: first that Moody is telling the truth, and second, that Jeb knows or at least suspects that he is Angel’s father. Jeb arrives at the barn and sees Angel, unconscious, lying next to Toke. Question one: is Toke dead or alive at this point?”
Nathan says, “I say he’s already dead.”
“If that’s so, then Jeb could have easily drawn the conclusion that a girl, who just might be his daughter, committed murder and then attempted suicide. To protect her, he carries her into the house to throw us off her trail.”
I say, “But according to Moody, he only hit Toke one time, and Toke was alive when the first car arrived. The autopsy report says that Toke got hit three times. Who struck the second and third blows?”
Kimball looks up, his face almost gray as he contemplates this worst-case scenario. “Jeb doesn’t want Toke to wake up and implicate Angel, so…he has to silence Toke.”
“That’s crazy,” Calder says. “Do you hear yourself, Sheriff? This is Jeb we’re talking about. Damn it, you know Jeb. You know he’d never kill anyone. Not in a million years.”
“I’m not saying Jeb killed Toke,” Kimball says. “I’m just saying that if any of this is even close to true, we’re in deep shit. A man who could be a suspect is hip-deep in the investigation. We need to bring him in and question him.”
“Are you the right guys for that job?” I ask.
“What are you implying?” Calder says.
“I’m not implying anything. I’m telling you outright. You need to call the BCA down here. You’re too close to this.”
“We can handle it,” Kimball says. “We’ll bring him in and get his version. If it looks like you might be right about this, then we’re off the case. But we’ll be the ones having the conversation with Jeb. In the meantime, this goes nowhere.” Kimball points his finger at me. “This is confidential stuff. We don’t want it leaking out, am I clear?”
I nod my agreement, despite my doubts.
Chapter 42
I walk back to Bob’s office and sit on the hood of my car to await his return. My ribs still hurt, but the four ibuprofens I took earlier have knocked the pain down to a dull throb. The excitement that coursed through my veins when I told Kimball about the affair is replaced with a vague melancholy. It might be residue from Lila’s words, or maybe I’m sad to think that Jeb is somehow involved with Toke’s death. I like Jeb, and a part of me is hoping that somewhere buried in that file Bob is getting, we’ll find the proof that I’m wrong.
Behind me, in the distance, I hear the rev of a motorcycle engine, and I don’t have to turn around to know that it’s Vicky. I’m sitting with my elbows resting on my knees, my chest curved to ease the pressure on my ribs. I cast a very small shadow as the sun climbs toward noon, and I hold that pose as she rides by, hoping that I might go unnoticed. It doesn’t work.
Vicky turns her Triumph around, rides back, and parks on the street beside me, killing her engine. “Hi, stranger.”
“Hi.” I feel like I should be cold to her, but my situation isn’t her fault.
“So, how bad was it?” she asks.
“Pretty bad,” I say.
“She break up with you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Not sure?”
“We’re…taking some time off, I guess.” I look at Vicky. Her cheeks are rosy from the wind, and she is sporting a half-smile, something that gives her face a hopeful appearance.
“Does that mean that I could…you know…stop by later?”
I hang my head back down and look at the pavement. “That’s not a good idea.”
“I see.”
“I really love my girlfriend,” I say. “I guess I should have made that clear.”
“You could have started by telling me that you had a girlfriend at all.” There is no spite in her voice. It almost sounds as if she’s apologizing, and that makes me feel even worse.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“Yeah…me too.” It is a wistful statement, one that sounds very much like a final goodbye. She starts her motorcycle, U-turns, and rides away.
I try to immerse myself back into thoughts of Jeb and Toke, but all I get are flashes of Lila, sitting on our bed, telling me to leave. The bar exam starts tomorrow morning. When it’s done, there will be a reckoning, and that thought scares me.
I expect Bob to be back by now, but the minutes trudge by with the sluggish gait of a wounded soldier. An hour passes, and I’m about to walk to the courthouse to check on him when Bob turns the corner with an accordion folder in his hands, waving me to follow him into his office. He looks winded from his walk.
“I was getting worried,” I say.
“I stopped by the Sheriff’s Office to see how they were taking the news about Jeb.”
“And?”
“They’re throwing a conniption over there. I could hear Kimball yelling to beat all hell. Then they walked by with Jeb in handcuffs, taking him to jail.”
“Jeb confessed?”
“Kimball told me that Jeb admitted to taking Angel into the house. That’s as far as it got. Jeb must have figured out that he was in a heap of trouble because he invoked his right to remain silent.”
“But they arrested him for Toke’s murder?”
“Not yet. They have him for interfering with a murder scene. It’s not a felony, but they can hold him overnight while they try to figure out what happened.”
“Moody was telling the truth.”
“Kimball’s recommending that Moody be released. The complaint they have is wrong and they know it.” Bob put the
Lynch file down on Jeannie’s desk. “I’m going back over to the jail. I want to tell Moody the good news.”
“Would you mind if I took a look through the file?” I ask.
Bob considers this for a few seconds and says, “Sure. Just do me a favor and don’t snoop around the office while I’m gone.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I say.
Bob is about to leave when he stops and slowly turns to face me, the thoughts in his head pinching his forehead into deep creases. “You know what this means, don’t you?”
“What what means?”
“If Jeb is Angel’s father…you see how that changes things.”
“Sure, it gives Jeb a motive to kill Toke, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
“No. That’s not what I’m getting at. Jeannie’s estate has been fully probated. Everything has been signed and sealed. That estate now belongs to Toke, and Toke alone.”
I don’t see where he’s going with this.
“If Toke is not Angel’s father, then by the laws of intestacy she can’t inherit. The estate is Toke’s, and every bit of it goes to his sole heir. The one person who can prove that he is Toke’s biological son.” Bob points his finger at me.
“That’s not…I had no idea.”
“Angel gets nothing.”
“But she’s Jeannie’s daughter.”
“I suppose Angel’s guardian could bring a petition to reopen the case, split the inheritance between Angel and Toke, but right now she has no guardian.”
“That’s what should happen,” I say.
“You say that now, but I’ve been doing this a long time. It’s easy to sound noble when the money is theoretical. It’s a different matter when the money becomes real. You’ll start thinking that six million sounds a whole lot better than three million. I’ve seen it happen.”
