Prey (Jefferson Winter)

by James Carol

  ‘And as soon as it turns up I’ll be sure to give you a call.’

  Yeah, right, thought Winter as he hung up.

  When Mendoza finally came out of the store, he was still sitting on the kerb staring along the street, his ass going numb from the cold concrete. He heard footsteps coming up behind him, heard them stop. He glanced over his shoulder, hand on his forehead, squinting to block out the sun. Mendoza was glaring down at him.

  ‘Let’s get going,’ he said. ‘Places to be, people to see.’

  He jumped to his feet, brushed off his jeans, and started back towards the station house. Before he’d got six yards, Mendoza dragged him to a stop and spun him around. He moved her hand off his shoulder.

  ‘You’re upset because Hailey’s upset. I get that. You don’t like seeing her cry. I get that, too. But someone has to ask tough questions.’

  ‘This has nothing to do with Hailey, and everything to do with the fact that you’ve dragged me all the way up here into the middle of nowhere to look into a murder that was solved years ago. That’s why I’m pissed.’

  ‘Liar.’

  ‘Excuse me.’

  ‘You’re not the hard ass that you’d like everyone to believe, Mendoza. If you were you wouldn’t have spent the last seven minutes and forty-three seconds in there talking to Hailey.’

  ‘You’d just assassinated the memory of her brother and sister-in-law. Someone had to pick up the pieces.’

  Winter raised an eyebrow. ‘And for the record, I wasn’t trying to hurt Hailey, I was trying to help her. The best way to do that is to uncover the truth. The Reed murders aren’t as straightforward as everyone is making out.’

  ‘No, they are straightforward. The truth is that Nelson snapped and killed the Reeds. Hailey believes that. Hell, the whole town believes that, and right now so do I. So everything you did back there was for nothing. Admit it.’

  ‘No, it wasn’t. If we’re going back to first principles with this, then we need to examine motive. How many murders have you dealt with that turned out to be crimes of passion? Plenty, right? They look complicated to start with, and there are all sorts of theories flying around, but when you get down to it the reason behind the murder was that someone was screwing someone they shouldn’t have been. Bottom line: I did what needed to be done. Those questions needed to be asked.’

  ‘But did you learn anything new?’

  ‘Okay, do you want to know the fundamental difference between us? The difference is that taking down the bad guy is your endgame.’

  ‘And it’s not yours? Don’t give me that crap, Winter. I saw your face when we took down Ryan McCarthy. It was like all your birthdays and Christmases had been rolled into one.’

  ‘But that’s not my endgame. My endgame is to stop these assholes.’

  Mendoza’s eyes narrowed and she shook her head. ‘Sorry, I don’t see the difference.’

  ‘The difference is that I couldn’t care less about the bad guy, or woman as is the case with Omar’s murder. No, all I care about is that they’re off the streets. If Ted Bundy hadn’t been stopped how many more women would he have killed?’

  ‘So you do this for the all the victims-who-might-have-been? Is that it?’

  ‘Look, we can’t be certain that Nelson Price killed the Reeds. Not a hundred per cent, at any rate. Yes, the evidence points that way, but the only people who really know what happened are all dead. Lester, Melanie and Nelson. What we do know, however, is that there’s a very dangerous and unpredictable killer out there and she needs to be stopped. If I need to upset a few people to do that, then I’ll do that again in a heartbeat. Hurt feelings I can deal with, but another dead body would really piss me off.’

  Ten minutes later they drove over the kissing bridge, heading out of town, a charged silence filling the BMW. Winter was guessing that they weren’t the first two people to cross this bridge when kissing was the last thing on their minds. They passed the sign that marked the town boundary and a couple of seconds later the sky disappeared behind the tree canopies.

  ‘The mom’s suicide doesn’t sit right,’ he said finally.

  Mendoza glanced over from the passenger seat. ‘People commit suicide every day, Winter.’

  ‘They do, but the kids make this situation different. If Eugene Price was beating his wife, chances were he wasn’t a candidate for Father of the Year. You heard Granville Clarke, everyone suspected that the kids were being abused but nobody could prove anything. The maternal bond is one of the strongest bonds there is. Knowing what Eugene was like, things must have gone beyond unbearable for her to leave the kids on their own with him.’

  ‘Maybe that’s exactly what happened. Things went beyond unbearable.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  Winter was thinking about his mother again. Things had gone beyond unbearable for her, yet she’d hung on in there. He had often wondered why she hadn’t killed herself, and the only reason he could come up with was that she hadn’t wanted to leave him on his own. After he started college, he had expected to get a phone call informing him that she’d taken a handful of pills or slashed her wrists in the bath, but the call never came.

  He only saw her once at the end. She’d been in the hospital, her body failing and her mind going. In her confusion she kept calling him by his father’s name, and that had made a hard situation impossible. He’d lasted less than five minutes before he left. He’d gone back to work at Quantico, arranged for her to be moved to a better hospital, made sure that everything was done that could be done to make her last days more comfortable, and waited for the call. In the end, it hadn’t been pills or a razor blade that killed her, it was the booze.

  ‘What do you think happened to the mom then?’ Mendoza asked.

  The road hung a sudden right and sunshine poured through the windshield, blinding him. He shielded his eyes and turned towards her.

  ‘I think that she was murdered. I think that Eugene Price took her out to the barn, put a rope around her neck and hung her. And I think he made the kids watch.’ He paused a moment. ‘What I can’t work out, though, is how any of this links to a New York diner at two in the morning, and a psychopath who likes making grand statements.’

  20

  The Monroe County Medical Examiner’s office was based in Brighton, a town buried in the southern suburbs of Rochester. Next door, the Lego-brick buildings of the Monroe Correctional Facility rose up out of the ground. The prison looked like it had been built by an unimaginative kid.

  They parked up and Winter got out. He stretched, lit a cigarette, zipped up his jacket, then stretched again, popping his bones and overextending his joints. Mendoza walked around the front of the car to join him. She repositioned her sunglasses, then brushed down her suit. Winter had only ever seen her look immaculate. First thing in the morning or the middle of the night, it made no difference. It really was a gift.

  They walked across the parking lot to the squat red-brick building that housed the ME’s office. It looked like it had been built by the same unimaginative kid who’d built the prison. Winter took a final pull on his cigarette, put it out in the ashtray next to the entrance, then ducked inside behind Mendoza before the door slid shut.

  The inside of the building was as bland as the outside. Beige was the dominant colour, and there was plenty of concrete and laminated wood. A large cheese plant provided the only real colour. The woman behind the reception desk looked up from her computer and showed a smile that contained plenty of teeth.

  ‘Detective Mendoza?’

  Mendoza smiled. ‘That’s right. We’re here to see Dr Griffin.’

  The receptionist looked momentarily perplexed.

  ‘Anything the matter? Dr Griffin is here, isn’t she?’

  ‘Yes, she’s here. It’s just that your voice sounded different on the phone.’

  Winter answered the accusations in Mendoza’s eyes with a shrug. The receptionist came around to the front of the desk and motioned for them to follow.
<
br />   ‘You know it’s illegal to impersonate a police officer,’ Mendoza hissed as they headed deeper into the building.

  ‘So, arrest me,’ Winter whispered back.

  They turned into another corridor and stopped at a door three-quarters of the way along. The brushed-steel plaque read DR ROSALEA GRIFFIN CHIEF MEDICAL EXAMINER. The receptionist knocked once, a light gentle tap.

  ‘Enter.’

  The receptionist pushed open the door and stood aside to let them past. Dr Griffin walked over to greet them. She was a good-looking woman in her mid-fifties. Her grey hair had been cut recently, the style short and easy to manage. Her short fingernails were manicured, and, although her suit wasn’t designer, it was made-to-measure. Either that or she’d got a lucky fit. Given that she was at least six and a half feet tall, it would have been one hell of a lucky find. She had a patch over her left eye, the outline picked out in diamante. Red, white and blue. Very patriotic.

  ‘Childhood accident,’ she offered by way of explanation in a slow Southern drawl. Winter waited for more, but there wasn’t any.

  ‘Would you like a coffee?’ she asked.

  ‘Black with two, please,’ said Winter.

  ‘White and no sugar for me,’ said Mendoza.

  ‘Make that three coffees please, Angela.’

  Angela ducked out of the doorway, pulling the door closed behind her. Griffin sat down and waved them into the chairs in front of the desk. Aside from the telephone, laptop and a single manila folder, the surface of the desk was empty. Winter unzipped his jacket and sat down. There was plenty of laminated wood here too. The floor, the desk, the bookcase. Certificates proclaiming Griffin’s competence were hung in matching pine frames behind the desk.

  ‘If you don’t mind me asking, why is the New York Police Department interested in a murder case that was closed six years ago?’ Griffin aimed the question at Mendoza.

  ‘The case impacts on our current one, but that’s all I can tell you.’

  There was a single gentle knock on the door and Angela entered carrying a tray. She found some mats and put the mugs down before slipping back out of the room.

  ‘Okay, let’s start over,’ Griffin suggested after the door had closed. She tapped her finger on the manila folder, drawing everyone’s attention to it. ‘Seems to me we’ve got a straight trade here. I have something you want. You have something I want.’

  ‘Why are you so interested?’ asked Mendoza.

  Griffin laughed like the answer was so obvious she couldn’t believe anyone would bother asking. ‘Because I’m nosy, and because I love mysteries. I get a mystery, I just have to solve it.’

  Winter smiled. He could relate. An unsolved puzzle drove him nuts. He looked Griffin straight in her good eye, then glanced down at the folder. It was unlikely the folder contained all the answers they were looking for, but it might contain some of them and that meant it was a no-brainer.

  He began to talk.

  21

  ‘Interesting,’ Griffin said when Winter finished talking. She drummed her fingers on the file again, drawing his attention back to it. ‘However, if you think you’re going to find proof in here that your mystery woman is guilty, or any clue as to who she might be, you’re going to be disappointed.’

  ‘You seem pretty sure of that.’

  ‘The statistics are on my side. Your mystery woman, was she right-handed?’

  Winter’s mind flashed back to the diner. He could see the blonde standing there. Her left arm was curled around the cook, the knife was in her right. He had a pretty good idea where Griffin was going with this. Roughly nine out of ten people were right-handed, and the doctor had said the statistics were on her side. ‘The person who killed the Reeds was left-handed?’

  Griffin nodded. ‘And I’m guessing your mystery woman isn’t.’

  ‘No she’s not.’

  ‘There’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that the Reeds’ killer was left-handed.’

  ‘And Nelson Price was left-handed?’

  Griffin nodded. ‘Yes, he was. Could your mystery woman be ambidextrous?’

  ‘Possible, but it’s a statistical improbability.’

  ‘You’ve already concluded that she didn’t do it, haven’t you?’

  ‘Going on the available evidence, it looks like Nelson Price did it.’

  ‘That wasn’t what I asked.’ Griffin narrowed her good eye and fixed it on Winter. He became aware that Mendoza was staring, too. It felt like they were ganging up on him. Strike that, they were ganging up on him.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Spit it out,’ Mendoza said. ‘Whatever crazy idea is swirling around in that massive over-sized brain of yours, I want to hear it.’

  Winter reached for his coffee and blew across the top to cool it down. He took a sip then put the mug back down. ‘How do you prove a negative?’

  ‘With difficulty,’ said Griffin.

  ‘Exactly. But, if you think about it, that’s what’s happening here. We’re trying to prove that our mystery woman didn’t kill the Reeds.’

  Mendoza looked momentarily puzzled. ‘Haven’t we already done that? I mean, all the evidence is pointing to Nelson Price being the killer. It seems straightforward enough to me.’

  ‘And that’s the point. Proving that Nelson did it is not the same as proving that our mystery woman didn’t do it.’

  ‘Okay,’ Mendoza continued, drawing each syllable out. She shook her head. ‘Sorry, I’m not following you. Really not following. If Nelson did it, he did it. End of story.’

  Griffin propped her elbows on the desk and leant forward. ‘What your friend here is alluding to is that this is a logical fallacy.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘How about this?’ said Winter. ‘If I tell you that some men are doctors and that some doctors are tall, then you would be happy to conclude that some men are tall, right?’

  ‘That makes sense.’

  ‘Except it doesn’t make sense. Okay, how about this? If some doctors are men and some doctors are women, then it follows that some men are women.’

  ‘That’s crazy.’

  ‘Invisible pink unicorns.’

  ‘Excuse me.’

  ‘Invisible pink unicorns have immense spiritual power. What other creatures have the ability to be both invisible and pink at the same time?’ Mendoza gave him the look, and he added, ‘The existence of invisible pink unicorns is an argument that is often used to refute a negative proof. How can you prove it isn’t pink if you can’t see it? Or to put it another way: just because Nelson Price is guilty, it doesn’t necessarily follow that our mystery woman is innocent. Two people can commit a murder, right?’

  ‘So why the hell didn’t you just say that, instead of making me sit through all that crap about pink unicorns and transgender medics?’

  Winter looked over at Griffin. ‘Was there any evidence pointing to a second person being involved?’

  Griffin shook her head slowly. ‘Not that I remember. But I’m really not the best person to ask. I just deal with the corpses. If memory serves, the investigation was headed up by Jeremiah Lowe.’

  ‘That doesn’t really help since he’s dead.’

  Griffin surprised him by laughing. ‘No, he’s not.’

  ‘Are you sure about that?’ Mendoza asked.

  ‘I’m positive. He retired a couple of years ago but I still see him occasionally. The last time was at a police function back in the summer.’ She laughed again. ‘Speaking in a professional capacity, I can assure you that he was very much alive. What made you think he was dead?’

  ‘That’s what we were told when we contacted the sheriff’s department last night. I can’t say that I’m surprised the mistake got made, though. When I pull a graveyard shift, I sometimes have trouble working out if I’m alive or dead.’

  ‘She needs her beauty sleep otherwise she gets cranky,’ Winter put in.

  Mendoza flashed him a dirty look.

  ‘See,’ he added. ‘Cranky as hell
. And you must have had at least three hours’ sleep, which, I might add, was three hours more than I had.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad I could help to straighten things out,’ Griffin said. ‘If you talk to Angela, I’m sure she’ll be able to track down Jeremiah’s number.’

  ‘That would be great.’

  Griffin pushed the file across the desk. ‘Here, you can keep this. I got Angela to make you a copy. I don’t know how much help it’s going to be, though. Any more questions?’

  Winter and Mendoza shook their heads.

  ‘In that case I’m going to have to bid you a good day.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Damn, I’d better get moving otherwise I’ll be late for my meeting. No rest for the wicked, eh?’

  22

  Jeremiah Lowe lived in Webster, a small town situated up in the north-east corner of Monroe County. It was close enough to Rochester to commute, but far enough away to breathe fresh air. His house was in Dunning Avenue, a wide street lined with trees and whitewashed clapboard houses. A scattering of leaves lay across the sidewalks. The area was middle class, respectable, a nothing-much-happening kind of place.

  Mendoza parked the BMW outside one of the smaller properties a quarter of the way along the street. Three bedrooms, Winter guessed. Big enough to raise a family, but just that little bit too big when the kids finally left home. The lawn had been mown within the last few days and the weed-free flower beds had been set straight in anticipation of the coming winter. The leaves had been raked that morning and lay in a neat heap near the garage. A Stars and Stripes flag flapped loosely in the breeze.

  Mendoza killed the engine, then reached into the back for the Reed’s autopsy reports and started reading. Winter had been through them already. Twice. Like Dr Griffin had said there wasn’t anything in there that could help them prove anything. Then again, there was nothing in there that disproved the blonde’s innocence, either.

  Logical fallacies.

  There were two people-shaped diagrams on the page Mendoza was reading. Two dots and a line had been used to create a face on one of them so you could tell which diagram was the front, and which was the back. Griffin had marked Melanie Reed’s injuries on it in her neat handwriting.