A Killer Past

by Maris Soule

  ‘Be prepared for a phone call,’ his son had said.

  From whom? Jack wondered.

  The United States Marshals handled the Witness Protection Program, and Jack knew the marshals were supposed to contact the local police department if a criminal was relocated to the area. If the Rivershore Police Department was notified forty-four years ago, he’d never heard anything. Of course Mary Smith would have arrived twenty years before he moved to Rivershore and joined the force. Back then, he wouldn’t have been in the ‘need to know’ loop, and since then, from what he’d discovered, Mary Smith Harrington hadn’t been involved in any crimes.

  Although witnesses nowadays might be foreigners who could testify against foreign terrorists, back when the program was first established they were primarily involved with the Mafia. Mary Smith Harrington was clearly not Italian.

  So what did she know that had made her so valuable she’d been given a new identity?

  ‘Who are you, Mrs Harrington?’ he muttered as he passed Maple Lake and entered the village of Paw Paw.

  At the Van Buren County Jail on South Kalamazoo Street, Jack forced himself to forget Mary Harrington. He’d been sent to interrogate a prisoner. He had to keep his mind on that. Most cases were won or lost during an interrogation rather than in court. He didn’t want to make any slip-ups that might allow a drug runner the chance to go free, and if they could connect this guy to Jose Rodriguez, he wouldn’t care who got the credit.

  During the time it took Jack to present his credentials and go through security, announce his intentions, and wait for Pedro Rodriguez to be delivered to a secure and private interrogation room, he prepared himself mentally and emotionally. He stood and smiled when Rodriguez arrived, and as soon as the handcuffs had been removed from Rodriguez’s wrists, Jack offered his hand. ‘Good morning, Mr Rodriguez, I’m Sergeant Jack Rossini, from the Rivershore Police Department.’

  Rodriguez didn’t shake his hand and didn’t speak. He was a good foot shorter than Jack, dark-skinned with shaggy black hair, black eyes, and a tattoo of an eagle holding a snake on his forearm. The man now wore the county’s issued orange jumpsuit, but according to the arrest report, at the time of his traffic stop Rodriguez had been wearing faded blue-jeans, a stained white T-shirt, a hooded gray sweatshirt, work boots, and a blue bandana tied around his wrist.

  ‘Sit down,’ Jack said and pointed at the chair on the opposite side of the table. ‘Would you like to be called Mr Rodriguez or Pedro?’

  Again, Rodriguez didn’t say anything, and when he didn’t move, Jack wasn’t sure if the man understood English. Then Rodriguez slowly walked around to the opposite side of the table and sat.

  ‘Because you were arrested, I have to advise you of your rights.’ Jack placed a copy of the Miranda rights in front of Rodriguez and read, line by line, from his copy. When he finished reading, he asked, ‘Do you understand your rights, Mr Rodriguez?’

  Rodriguez nodded, his expression sullen.

  ‘You need to answer out loud,’ Jack said, knowing the video tape of the interrogation would show Rodriguez’s nod, but it was better for a jury to hear the man say he understood.

  ‘I understand,’ Rodriguez grumbled.

  Jack suppressed a sigh of relief. At least Rodriguez understood and spoke English. If he hadn’t, they would have had to get an interpreter in the room, which would lessen the intimacy Jack wanted to establish.

  ‘Could you please initial each line and sign that paper, indicating you understand your rights?’

  Jack handed Rodriguez a pen, and Rodriguez initialed and signed the paper. As soon as Jack had the signed paper and his pen back, he began his questioning. ‘How old are you, Mr Rodriguez?’

  ‘Twenty.’ Rodriguez looked around the room, probably searching for the hidden video camera and microphone. When he faced Jack again, he added, ‘You call me Pedro, OK? And I call you Jack.’

  ‘That’s fine with me, Pedro. So where do you live?’

  ‘I stay in Detroit, Jack.’ He said it boldly and proudly.

  Pleased that Rodriguez was finally talking, Jack pulled out his notebook. ‘Where in Detroit? What is your address?’

  Once Jack had that information written down, he went on. ‘You live alone, Pedro, or with someone else?’

  Pedro gave a glib smile. ‘I’m a good boy. I live with mi madre.’

  As much as Jack wanted to comment on the ‘good boy’ bit, he kept his question neutral. ‘Anyone else live with you and your mother?’

  Pedro shook his head, then evidently remembered Jack’s order that he speak aloud. ‘No. No one.’

  ‘Does the car you were driving belong to your mother?’ Jack already knew from the report he’d been given that the car was registered to an Andy Gomez.

  ‘It belong to mi madre’s boyfriend.’

  Jack feigned surprise. ‘Oh. So does this boyfriend also live with you and your mother?’

  ‘Sometimes, sí. Sometimes no.’

  ‘Did this boyfriend ask you to drive his car over here?’

  Pedro looked away and stared at a spot on the bare wall.

  After a long moment of silence, Jack revised his question. ‘Does your mother’s boyfriend know you have his car?’

  Again Jack waited. Finally Pedro shook his head, and then looked back at Jack. ‘No. But he say I can use it any time I want.’

  ‘So last night you took him up on that offer,’ Jack said, concerned that a defense attorney might use that information to indicate Pedro had no idea the cocaine was in the trunk.

  His job, Jack knew, was to somehow prove Pedro was delivering the cocaine to Jose Rodriguez. He decided to try a more gentle tone. ‘You’re a long way from Detroit. What brought you over on this side of the state?’

  ‘I dunno,’ Pedro mumbled, keeping his gaze averted.

  ‘Do you have friends in Rivershore?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Explain to me. Who are these friends?’

  ‘Maybe a cousin.’

  ‘Maybe?’ Jack repeated and smiled. ‘Is Jose Rodriguez your cousin?’

  Pedro nodded.

  ‘You have to speak up,’ Jack reminded him. ‘Tell me how you’re related to Jose.’

  This time Pedro looked at him. ‘He my father’s brother’s son.’

  This was information Jack wanted. ‘So you’re first cousins. Do you come over here often to see Jose?’

  ‘Sometimes.’ Again he shrugged. ‘I come when I can.’

  ‘Did Jose ask you to bring him something? Maybe something from his father. Or maybe from your mother’s boyfriend?’

  Pedro started fussing with a spot on his arm, rubbing it with his other hand. Jack couldn’t see anything on the arm and knew Pedro was simply stalling, trying to come up with an answer.

  ‘Did Jose ask you to bring him the cocaine we found in the car you were driving?’

  ‘No.’ Pedro finally answered. ‘I didn’t know there was cocaine in the car. I was just driving around. Just driving.’

  Not the answer Jack wanted, but he went on. ‘So you were surprised when Officer VanDerwell found the cocaine?’

  ‘Si. I surprised.’

  Jack wasn’t sure if he believed him. ‘Are we going to find more cocaine in the car?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How about anything else? Will we find anything else in the car?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘You tell me.’ Pedro’s expression alone told Jack they would find something.

  ‘Maybe some marijuana.’

  Jack already knew about the marijuana. Stu had found a bag of it shoved under the driver’s seat. ‘Anything else besides the marijuana?’

  Pedro didn’t answer, and Jack waited, hoping the silence would become uncomfortable, and Pedro would talk. But when a couple of minutes went by with Pedro saying nothing, Jack tried again.

  ‘You know if I can tell the DA you were cooperative, I’m sure he’ll go easier on you.’

  Pedro sighed and licked his lip
s, then shrugged. ‘Maybe, if you look under the spare tire, you might find a few rocks.’

  Bingo. Jack knew these wouldn’t be rocks like the ones in a field and alongside a road. These ‘rocks’ would be crusted, brownish lumps of cooked cocaine. Crack cocaine. And if Pedro knew about them, he would have known about the cocaine under the blanket.

  ‘You planning on selling those rocks?’

  ‘Me? No, I no sell anything like that,’ Pedro insisted.

  Right, Jack thought and smiled. Selling a kilo of cocaine on the street would be difficult, but the cost of a rock was reasonable: five to ten dollars a hit. ‘If you weren’t going to sell it, who were you delivering the cocaine and rocks to?’

  ‘No one, man.’

  ‘Oh, come on,’ Jack said. ‘You expect me to believe that? Where were you headed? To Jose’s?’

  Pedro shook his head, but beads of sweat were starting to form on the boy’s forehead.

  Jack leaned toward him. ‘You know, I appreciate how cooperative you’ve been, but you’re not cooperating now. If I don’t get some answers, we could just turn this over to the feds. You get convicted, and you’d be spending a lot more time in a little cell.’

  Jack saw a flicker of fear in Pedro’s eyes, and played on it. ‘Like I said before, what you tell me today, Pedro, can make things go easier. Where were you headed when Officer VanDerwell stopped you?’

  ‘I was just driving,’ Pedro said, running his fingers through his thick, black hair. ‘Just driving.’

  ‘I see.’ Jack sat back and watched Pedro nervously rearrange a lock of hair. ‘So you drove from Detroit to Rivershore, about 170 miles give or take a few. You did this with a kilo of cocaine in your trunk and who knows how many rocks … just for fun?’

  ‘Sure.’ Pedro nodded. ‘I like to drive.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘I don’t believe you, Pedro. And no judge or jury will believe you. If you weren’t delivering that load to anyone, then you must be the dealer. That means you’ll be an old man before you’re out of that prison cell.’

  Pedro looked down at his lap, but Jack could see a tear slide down the boy’s cheek. The kid probably was a mule, an expendable in the world of drug pushers. ‘Who were you delivering the cocaine and rocks to?’ Jack repeated, his voice softer this time, more consoling.

  ‘I …’ Pedro sniffed. ‘I talk to you, they’ll kill me.’

  ‘We’ll protect you,’ Jack said, though he wasn’t sure if they really could.

  The boy must have had the same thought. He raised his head, and looked Jack in the eyes. ‘I think I don’t want to say anything more. I want a lawyer.’

  ‘You’re sure?’ Jack waited, hoping the boy would change his mind.

  ‘I’m sure. I want a lawyer.’

  ‘Then we’re through.’ Jack closed his notebook and put away his pen. As he rose to his feet, he smiled at Pedro. ‘Why do you think you were stopped last night?’ he asked, dropping his voice slightly, as if letting Pedro in on a secret. ‘I mean, you weren’t doing anything wrong. You hadn’t broken any laws. Didn’t you wonder why you’d been stopped?’

  ‘I wonder,’ Pedro said, his expression suspicious.

  ‘We knew.’ Jack said with what he hoped appeared to be an all-knowing nod. ‘Your cousin Jose may think he has loyal followers, but one of his gang is talking.’

  ‘Impossible,’ Pedro insisted, shaking his head. ‘No one crosses Jose.’

  ‘Impossible?’ Jack chuckled and stepped away from the table. ‘When you see him, tell him he’d better watch his back.’

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  THE TENSION MARY had felt when she heard the doorbell disappeared the moment she looked through the peephole and saw just the top of a head, the white hair peeking out from under a purple bandana short and curly. Ella Williams might be considered a nosy neighbor, but she certainly wasn’t a gang member out for revenge.

  ‘Ella,’ Mary said, smiling as she opened her front door. ‘What brings you out in the cold?’

  ‘I’ve been talking to neighbors,’ Ella said, a shiver in her voice as she pulled at the sides of her red wool coat in an effort to cover her rounded hips and stomach. ‘About the Neighborhood Watch.’ She glanced past Mary. ‘May I come in? I thought you’d want to hear what’s up.’

  ‘Of course.’ Mary knew, whether she wanted to or not, she was going to hear what Ella had been doing. ‘Come on in.’

  She closed the door and waited as Ella removed her scarf and gloves, stuffed them into a pocket, and finally shrugged out of her coat. ‘I can’t believe how cold it is,’ Ella said, rubbing her hands together.

  ‘A cup of tea should help,’ Mary offered, placing Ella’s coat on a peg next to her own black windbreaker, before leading the way to the kitchen.

  A few minutes later, they were both seated at the table with mugs of hot tea and slices of a pound cake that Mary had bought on the way home from the gym. ‘I called the police department this morning,’ Ella said after a bite of the pound cake. ‘They’re supposed to have one of the officers contact me.’

  ‘You’re serious about this, aren’t you?’

  ‘Aren’t you?’ Ella frowned. ‘Sometimes, Mary, I just don’t understand you. Here we are, two widows living by ourselves. It could have been one of us attacked the other night.’

  ‘And you think a Neighborhood Watch would have stopped what happened?’

  ‘Maybe. Maybe we’ve all been too complacent. Didn’t you say you saw a strange car hanging around on Halloween?’

  ‘Which may have belonged to a parent.’ Not that Mary truly believed that.

  ‘Fine. Maybe it did, but if we knew our neighbors and what cars they drove, we’d know for sure, wouldn’t we?’

  ‘OK, maybe you’re right.’ Mary studied her friend. In the thirty-five years she’d known Ella, she’d never seen the woman so enthusiastic about anything … other than her cats. ‘But are you sure you don’t simply want to know what our neighbors are up to?’

  The moment the words were out of her mouth, Mary knew she’d said the wrong thing.

  ‘I am not a nosy gossip,’ Ella said, sitting back in her chair, her double chin lifted and her mouth puckered. ‘No matter what George Figer says.’

  Mary didn’t think it wise to mention that Ella seemed to know a lot about everyone in the neighborhood and didn’t hesitate to pass the information on to anyone who would listen. ‘I take it George wasn’t receptive to the Neighborhood Watch idea.’

  ‘Said he wasn’t spying on his neighbors, not like some people he knew.’ Ella snorted. ‘Looked right at me when he said that.’

  ‘I wouldn’t let him bother you,’ Mary said, feeling a little sorry for Ella. ‘He’s always been the neighborhood grouch. So how many people have you talked to?’

  ‘Everyone up and down our street.’ Ella relaxed her shoulders and took a sip of tea before going on. ‘I didn’t try anywhere else today. I’m a little afraid about going over onto Archer Street after what happened to those boys last week. Maybe if you went with me…?’

  Mary heard the implied question and shook her head. She was not going anywhere near Archer Street, not as long as there was the possibility someone might remember seeing her there the night the boys were attacked.

  ‘Why not?’ Ella asked. ‘Some of those people might recognize you from that newspaper article, might be more willing to talk to you than they would me.’

  ‘Ella, I’m not going around talking to people. I’m sorry I even talked to that reporter.’

  ‘I don’t see why,’ Ella said. ‘It was a good article. It’s about time people realize we’re not all sitting around in our rocking chairs, knitting, and watching games and talk shows.’ She chuckled. ‘Well, maybe I do, but you don’t. That was a good picture of you.’

  Which was the worst part of the article, in Mary’s opinion. She’d agreed when the reporter asked if they could take a picture of her on the treadmill. Mary had even suggested they take the picture from a distance, to
show the variety of exercise machines available to seniors. Then, as the photographer took his pictures, she kept her head turned slightly, so her face wasn’t clearly visible. Which may have been why they didn’t use any of those shots. Instead they used a picture Mary hadn’t known they’d taken. One that clearly showed her face as she lifted barbells. All she could hope was her white hair, sagging chin, and wrinkles would keep anyone from her past from recognizing her.

  ‘I’m not going around talking to people,’ Mary repeated.

  ‘OK, OK.’

  Head down, Ella took another bite of her pound cake. Mary said nothing, simply waited for Ella’s next request. She didn’t have to wait long.

  ‘Do you still have that fancy printer Harry bought before he died?’

  ‘I still have it.’ Even though Robby had longingly eyed the printer/scanner/copier after his father’s death, Mary had decided to keep it, along with Harry’s PC.

  ‘Would you be willing to make some copies of fliers I could pass out?’ Ella asked. ‘I mean, I’d pass them out. You’d just have to make the copies.’

  ‘Sure.’ Mary couldn’t see any harm in that.

  ‘We’ll need them to let people know when our first meeting will be … and where.’ She looked toward Mary’s living room. ‘I guess we should meet somewhere other than a house. I mean, if we have a lot of people come, we wouldn’t have enough room in someone’s house.’

  ‘Have you checked with any of the churches?’

  ‘Not yet.’ Ella finished her last bite of cake and took one more sip of tea before she pushed herself back from the table and stood. ‘I guess I’d better do that next.’

  Mary walked with Ella to the door. As she waited for her friend to put on her coat, scarf, and gloves, she let her fingers play over the grooves on the kubotan in her pocket. She didn’t think about what she was doing until Ella asked, ‘What’s that you have in your pocket?’

  ‘My pocket?’ Mary jerked her hand out of her pocket. ‘Nothing.’

  Ella’s eyebrows rose suspiciously.

  ‘It’s just a stick.’ Mary knew Ella’s curiosity would be worse than showing her the kubotan, so she pulled it out. ‘It’s just something I picked up. I liked the shape.’ She smiled, hoping her voice sounded natural. ‘I’ve been using it like one of those worry stones. It makes me feel a little safer.’