“Sure thing, Chief.”
Wes stepped out of the man’s way and let him pass.
There was a joke around the station that the extent of the chief’s agitation was always in direct proportion to the length of his stride. This afternoon, he was at the front door in less than six strides.
Wes held his breath as Nina walked through the front door. She smiled pleasantly at the chief and held the door for him. He touched his fingers to the side of his cap in a modified salute, his usual response to a pretty woman. Wes shook his head and tried not to laugh.
Nina came into the lobby and started to ask for him when she saw him in the hall. She smiled and waved.
Wes walked toward her, the file in his hand.
“Thanks so much for finding that for me, Detective.” She met him halfway.
“I thought we were doing first names,” he said.
“Right. Wes,” she corrected herself. “Is that the file?”
“Yes, but it’s the original. I’m going to have to make a copy. Want to come on into the back?”
“Sure. Thanks. I’m sorry to make you go through the trouble, but I couldn’t find the list anywhere.”
“It’s no trouble.” He held open the door to the small room that held the copy machine, the fax machine, and a bank of filing cabinets. He made the copy and handed it to her.
She skimmed the list until she found what she was looking for.
“This is the book?” Her jaw all but dropped. “Hansen’s Guide to Literary Critiques?”
He looked over her shoulder.
“Yeah, that’s the one. It’s still in the box. I just saw it.”
“Well, that makes no sense at all.” She shook her head. “Here I was thinking that he’d taken some book of poetry or something to her apartment. You know, to read love poems or whatever. Even some classy prose, but a reference book?”
“That’s what we found there.”
“If you were going to see your girlfriend, would you take a reference book along?”
“Depends. Maybe she needed to look something up. Or maybe he was loaning it to her.”
“She was a senior biology major. It said so in the file. There’s no way she would have been using that book. That was for his freshman class for English majors, the kids who tested out of the standard required freshman English course. Maureen Thomas would not have asked to borrow that book.”
“Then maybe he was taking it home with him.”
“Sorry, but no. For one thing, why take it out of the car? For another, he had a copy of this book in his office at home. I know, because I took that course from another professor, and I used his book.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “This just doesn’t make sense.”
“That’s the book we found there, Nina.”
“May I see it?”
“I don’t see why not.” He picked up his file and held the door for her, and then led the way back to the storage room.
He turned the light on and pointed to the box on the middle shelf.
“It’s right in here,” he told her as he opened the box. He took out the book and handed it to her.
She paged through it carefully, then stopped inside the front cover, to the place where Stephen Madden had written his name.
Nina stared at the signature, then looked up at Wes and said, “I can’t think of one good reason why this book would have been in that girl’s apartment, unless someone else put it there.”
“Who would have had access to his things?” Wes asked, then answered his own question. “At home, Kyle would have. At school, Dr. Overbeck.”
She nodded.
“I didn’t go into my father’s study when I was at the house. I wish now that I had.” She thought it over for a minute, then told Wes, “I can still do that. I’ll stop at the house on my way home and see if Kyle is there. I’ll tell him I changed my mind, and that I decided I do want to look over—”
“Uh-uh.” Wes shook his head. “There’s no way you’re going into that house alone. Not with Stillman a top number on our hot list.”
“Well, how about if I stop over now? I still have a key; if he’s not there, I’ll just go in. He’ll never know I was there.”
“And if he’s at home?”
She stared at him for a long moment. “Okay, how about if we do this. You follow me. I’ll stop at the house. If he’s not there, I’ll go in. If he is, you’ll see me go inside, and three minutes later, you ring the doorbell. If no one answers, break the door down.”
“I don’t like it, but I can’t stop you,” Wes told her. “Fine. I’ll follow you.”
“Good.” Nina looked down at the box. “What other sort of evidence is in there?”
“Everything from the clothes the victim wore that night to her personal phone book.”
She thought about that for a minute, then said, “Did you ever think of testing some of it for DNA and that sort of thing?”
“Frankly, no. And since we don’t have anything to compare it to, what’s the point?” He returned the box to the shelf.
“On TV, you always see the detectives using those little sticky rollers, the kind you use to remove lint from your clothing.”
Wes started toward the door, but Nina didn’t move.
“What if you rolled one of those over the clothing in the boxes now?”
“For what purpose?” He stopped in the doorway.
“To see what trace evidence is there. Hair, maybe. On TV, they always find hair on the rollers.” She stared at him, and he could have sworn he saw wheels turning behind her eyes. “Supposing we rolled the clothes from all four girls. Supposing we took the hairs we found there, and compared them to hair from the victims—you probably have something that has their DNA, right?—and from my father. Then we see if someone else’s hair is there.”
“First of all, we have no way of getting any of your father’s hair. Second of all, even if we found hair or let’s say even semen that doesn’t match your dad, how do we match that to someone else?” Wes let that sink in, then added, “We can’t force either Kyle or Overbeck to give samples, we have no probable cause.”
“We suspect that Dr. Overbeck—”
“Not good enough. We have a theory. That’s all.” He watched the disappointment on her face. “It’s a good idea, Nina, but I don’t know that we’d find anything.”
“You don’t know that we wouldn’t. And just FYI, the box of stuff that came from the prison had my dad’s comb in it. So we probably have his DNA, if anyone’s interested in testing it.”
Wes considered the possibility.
“We’d still have to get it analyzed. As backed up as the county lab is, there’s no way I could get this around the chief.”
“Mitch said if you needed help from the FBI lab, to just say the word.”
Wes was still thinking.
“What do we have to lose?” she whispered.
Only my job, he could have said, but decided against it. It had been a long time since anyone had appealed to him as much as Nina did, and an even longer time since he’d gotten to play hero to anyone.
“I’ll be right back,” he told her.
“Where are you going?”
“To see if I have any of those lint rollers in my desk.”
Two hours and forty minutes and three sticky rollers later, Wes was still working on the evidence from Maureen Thomas’s case. He’d already rolled her clothing and bagged every sheet of sticky paper separately and was starting on the pillowcase and the bedsheet. They’d need more rollers and plastic bags in order to collect the traces from the other three case evidence boxes.
“We’re done for today,” Wes told her. “We can’t do any more until I get some more supplies. We’ve gone through every roller in the building.”
“So what now?”
“So tomorrow I’ll pick up some more lint rollers and a few more boxes of sandwich bags and I’ll finish the job.”
She watched him load the samples into several
brown evidence envelopes.
“What about the sheet?” she asked.
He folded it carefully. “We’re going to have it tested, too. There are three stains still visible. They may or may not give us anything, but you’re right. Let’s test it all.”
Wes found a box to carry it all in.
“Ready?” he asked before turning out the light.
She nodded and followed him into the hall.
“Why not give that stuff to me, and I’ll ask Regan to get it to Mitch. I think she’ll be seeing him tomorrow night.”
“I’d rather hand it over myself. Let’s not compromise the chain of possession.” He thought aloud as they walked toward the lobby. “Supposing we do find something that points to someone else. It isn’t going to look good if it comes out that the evidence was temporarily in the hands of the daughter of the man who’d been convicted of the murders.”
“Good point.” She paused outside the door.
“Do you still have time to stop at Kyle’s? It’s after six.”
“Only if we can stop for dinner first,” Wes told her. “I’m starving.”
“I could eat,” she admitted.
“There’s a really good Italian restaurant about three blocks from here.”
“Great. I love Italian.” She smiled and walked toward the Land Rover, which was parked in the visitor’s spot near the front door. “I’ll follow you.”
The drive to the restaurant took less than five minutes. Wes parked his car out front and got out to wait for Nina while she tried to parallel park the Land Rover.
“Sorry it took me so long,” she said when she finally got out of the vehicle after the fourth attempt to park was successful. “I was never very good at parallel parking, and since I don’t have a car in New York, I hardly ever drive anymore. It takes me a while to get the hang of it.”
She locked the vehicle and stopped when she realized what she’d said.
“Probably not what you want to say to a cop.”
“I didn’t hear a word.” Wes grinned and opened the door to the restaurant.
There were fewer than twenty tables in the small storefront, and all but three were occupied.
“This looks like a popular place,” Nina observed.
“Best Italian food in Stone River.” Wes nodded.
A woman in a dark dress and silvery gray hair waved to Wes from the back of the restaurant.
“Oh, Detective, I almost didn’t recognize you,” she told him as she approached.
“What do you mean? I was here just last weekend.”
“Yes, but it’s been so long since I’ve seen you with a date, I didn’t believe my eyes.” She winked at Nina and picked up menus from the table that stood near the front door. “This way, Detective . . . and your lovely date.”
Wes decided it would be more trouble than it was worth to try to explain to Dellarosa, who owned the restaurant with her husband, that Nina was not his date. Besides, Nina had shrugged good-naturedly, so he let it ride.
“This is a good table, Benny will wait on you tonight,” Dellarosa told them as she seated them at a table near the back of the restaurant. “I’ll have him bring you a glass of wine in just a minute. Does the lady like the red that you favor?”
Wes looked at Nina for help.
“Red is fine, thank you.”
After Dellarosa walked away, Nina asked, “Didn’t this used to be Caramuzzi’s?”
“Yeah, you remember that?”
“I do. I used to have dinner here with my friends from school. I loved their spaghetti sauce.”
“Whose spaghetti sauce you love?” Dellarosa appeared as if out of thin air.
“Nina was just saying that she used to eat here when she was in college, and she liked the sauce,” Wes explained.
“Ah, Caramuzzi’s. My sister and her husband.” Dellarosa nodded. “We bought from them twelve years ago. How long it’s been since you were here?”
“Sixteen years,” Nina told her.
“You liked my sister’s sauce, you’ll love mine.” Dellarosa winked again and patted Nina on the back as she went into the kitchen.
“The decor is pretty much the same.” Nina looked around the restaurant.
“Same paintings, I think. Same music. Same menu. Not a lot has changed around here since you left.”
“So it would seem.” Nina glanced at the menu before closing it and setting it aside. “I did notice there were a few more shops out there on Main Street, some nice boutiques and a coffee shop. The bookstore is new, and I think there used to be a grocery store on the corner across the street. And there was a drugstore here somewhere, wasn’t there?”
“Yeah, Kimmel’s Drugstore was at the far end of the street. They sold out a few years back, when one of the chains built a store in that new mall right outside of town. There’s a big grocery store out there, too.”
“The streetscape looks pretty much the same, though. The store facades haven’t changed.”
“I think the local historical group is trying to keep the original architecture.” Wes looked up as the waiter approached. “Ahhhhh, here’s Benny with our wine. Thanks, pal.”
“Here’s your red, from Dellarosa’s private stock. She said to ask the lady how she likes it.” Benny poured from the bottle into one of the two glasses he carried in his left hand, and passed the glass to Nina.
“The lady likes it just fine,” Nina told him after tasting it, and Benny topped off her glass, then poured a glass for Wes. “Now, do we know what we’re having?”
“Depends on who’s in the kitchen,” Wes deadpanned.
“Tonight, Frankie’s sister Elle.”
“She makes the chicken piccata?”
Benny just smiled. “Will that be for two?”
“Nina?” Wes asked.
“Sure. I love chicken piccata.”
Benny gathered the menus. “She never had it like Elle’s, right, Detective?”
Wes tipped his wineglass in the direction of the kitchen before taking a sip. “She’s the best cook in the family.”
“I won’t tell her you said so,” Benny whispered, “because then Frankie would want to hurt you.”
He walked away as quietly as he’d appeared.
“Some place,” Nina said.
“The best in town,” Wes agreed.
They seemed to run out of things to say, so they each sipped their wine and pretended to watch the other diners.
“Were you able to locate Mrs. Owens?” Nina asked after the passage of a few too many minutes of silence.
“I haven’t had a chance to look.”
“I think she’s a good person for you to talk to. I’m surprised I didn’t think of her sooner. She knew everyone on the faculty.”
“I thought she was the English department secretary.”
“She was, that year. And for a few years before,” Nina explained, “but before that she’d been with the math department. And I seem to remember her telling me once that before that she’d worked for the history department.”
“So she really did know everyone.”
“I’m surprised that wasn’t reflected in the interview that was in the file.”
“I don’t remember an interview with her.” Wes frowned.
“Probably because it wasn’t you who spoke with her. It was someone named Raymond. He didn’t ask her very many questions.” She lifted her glass so her salad could be served. “It didn’t seem like he did a very good job.”
“Well, don’t say that too loud.” Wes grimaced. “Detective Raymond is now Chief Raymond. You passed him on the way into the station today.”
“Heavyset guy, all spit and polish. All uniformed up?”
“That was him.”
“He worked the investigation with you, back then?”
“He was the lead detective.”
“Hmmmm” was all Nina said.
“I take it you weren’t impressed?”
“Let’s just say they don’t do things
that way on CSI.”
“Here’s a tip.” He leaned toward her and lowered his voice as if sharing a secret. “No one really does things the way they do on CSI. That’s television. This is reality.”
“I like the TV way much better,” Nina said as she speared a sliver of cucumber. “It always ends up so neat and tidy.”
“It rarely does in real life, I’m afraid. With some cases, it seems like everything that can go wrong, does.”
“Do you think my dad’s case was like that?”
When Wes didn’t respond right away, Nina said, “I’m sorry. I guess that wasn’t a very good question.”
“It isn’t that it’s a bad question, it’s simply one I can’t answer. Back then, we didn’t have the benefit of technology that we have now. And yes, now we do have DNA and all kinds of tests that we can run, but it doesn’t always happen. And when it does, it isn’t always done right. There are labs that for years did DNA testing that were recently shut down due to irregularities in their testing procedures. So sometimes, even when you have the benefit of the technology, you get screwed over by human error.” Wes ate his salad for a minute, then told her, “Sixteen years ago, we really believed we had a lock on that case. We had the offender in cuffs within three days of finding the last victim. We’d looked at the evidence we had and we followed the trail right to your father.”
He put his fork down and looked across the table at Nina. “Now, in light of everything that’s come up these past few weeks, I have to wonder if we weren’t led to him by the real killer.”
“That upsets you.” She’d watched his face, and saw the conflicting emotions.
“Upsets me?” He considered the word. “I’m going to be more than upset if it turns out that someone concocted this scheme and led us through it. I’m going to be really pissed off. I don’t like being manipulated.”
“I don’t blame you.” She finished her salad and played with a rejected piece of tomato. “So that’s why you’re willing to see this through? Because you feel as if you were manipulated?”
“It’s one reason, but not the only one. If your father was unjustly accused, unjustly convicted, I will have that on my conscience for the rest of my life. He died a convicted murderer. There’s no way anyone could make that up to him, or to you. But oh, yeah, if someone set him up?” Wes’s jaw set squarely. “Will I find him? What do you think?”
Dark Truth Page 18
