Found Innocent

by Carolyn Arnold

  Terry read from the report he had taken from her hand. “Sovereign says no one had reason to harm Thorne. He had no enemies. Maybe this guy did take care of himself?”

  With the evidence presented, or the lack thereof, she could see why the case had been concluded suicide—it was the simple solution. She hated that realization. She hated it even more so because she had been with the man who, out of eagerness to move on to the next case, was willing to shut his eyes to what still needed to be uncovered.

  “Do we have any witness testimony?”

  Terry went through the folder and found the one labeled by the same wordage. He opened it and started reading.

  “Are you going to share it with me?” Madison asked.

  “They interviewed the motel manager, the housekeeper, the people renting out the room beside Thorne’s. Here.” He handed her the folder and dropped into a chair. She pulled one over near him and sat down.

  “Who found him?” She went back to Sovereign’s notes, skimmed them, and answered her own question. “Sheila Bolton, the housekeeper. It says here her shift started at eight in the morning that day. She got to Thorne’s room around ten.”

  Terry went through the folders and found the interview with Bolton. Seconds after looking at the contents, he lifted his eyes to match hers.

  “Nothing useful. I mean she basically described the scene exactly as they found it.” Terry put his hands over the spread of photos.

  “She didn’t see anyone? Hear anything?”

  “Like you said, her shift didn’t start until eight. TOD was pinned at between two and three.”

  Madison looked over the table at the bagged evidence of which there was very little. She looked at the evidence report list. “Condoms, unused.” Madison glanced at Terry. “That would explain how his DNA got into our girl.”

  “Our girl?” Terry raised his brows.

  “You know what I mean. Lacy.”

  “It is okay to say vic, Maddy.”

  Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Let’s assume he met up with Lacy at this motel, why did she leave? And is it a coincidence that our only potential witness to help us get closer to the truth is also dead?”

  “There were also the people in the neighboring room,” Terry said.

  “Their statement was they were sleeping and heard nothing. We could always do a follow-up call on them, though, and see if their memories have been sparked.”

  “Their home address is two hours from the city. You’re approaching this as a homicide.” Concern swept over his face.

  “Well, it’s definitely suspi—”

  “Hennessey or Bates could look good for this, but what if the fiancée found out about our vic, the other lady?”

  Madison could tell by the flash in his eyes that he had used the label to refer to Lacy to make a jab at her. She didn’t acknowledge it. “She came to me claiming her fiancé would never kill himself because—”

  “Yeah, because she knew he wouldn’t, because she did. If she’s in our face, we would never suspect her.”

  “But why bring it up? The case was closed.” She waved a hand in the air, gesturing in the direction of the holding cells. “Wait a minute, there are too many possibilities here. We have two guys who loved her, in their own way, mind you. One said she was a sweet girl. However, both of them knew about an older man. Obviously they knew about the condo and that Lacy was being taken care of, but maybe they had the wrong guy.” She stopped talking, the revelation smacking her. “What if they found out about her sleeping with Thorne? What if they killed him but made it look like a suicide? They had access to drugs.”

  “I believe it seems more likely than Vilma, Thorne’s fiancée. Aren’t you always saying women know when their man is sleeping around?”

  Madison felt her lashes touch her skin, as she blinked slowly. Still, years later, she felt the stab to her heart when her past betrayal resurfaced. She hadn’t known before she’d walked in on her fiancé with the other woman.

  “I do say that.”

  She hated being made a fool of so it was a secret she chose to carry. It wasn’t the truth, sometimes no matter how much one thinks they know someone, it doesn’t make their opinions of them gospel.

  “You don’t sound convincing.”

  “Listen, it’s this woman, all right. She was hysterical. There was something in her eyes, helplessness.”

  “I’d be hysterical if I killed someone too. What’s to say she didn’t want to—”

  “But what sense would it make for her to have us look at the case again? She was off, free and clear.”

  “Point taken,” Terry said.

  She saw it in her partner’s eyes. The case had been closed and she was supposed to let it go. “I can’t just walk away.”

  “This is going to create a real mess, you do know that?”

  “What I know is that I have one body in the morgue, one six feet under, and neither of them should be where they are.”

  “You’re going to reopen the case? Treat Thorne as a suspicious death, not suicide?” Terry asked.

  Madison tossed the file on the table. “I don’t see what other choice we have.”

  -

  Chapter 29

  THEY SPENT THE NEXT FEW hours sorting through the evidence, the interviews, and the forensic findings. To see all the DNA contributors pulled from the motel room, Madison’s stomach tossed. Motels were a breeding ground for bacteria and infection.

  “There was evidence of sexual intercourse in the bed. Semen and vaginal fluid were pulled and tested.” Madison’s face contorted. “There were two dominant donors and five other exemplars. Not dominant enough to pull DNA strands from, but identifiable as coming from other sources.” She looked at her partner. “Do they not wash the sheets in hot water? Gives me shivers to think about it. Maybe that’s why I never go anywhere.”

  “You don’t go anywhere because you’d have to actually take off work. A holiday? You might want to try it at some point before you’re eighty.”

  “I’ll relax once I’m retired.”

  Terry let out a deep breath and shook his head.

  “Come on. Let’s not talk about this now.”

  “Okay. But we should talk about it.”

  “Terry.”

  He held up his hands. “All right. So we know that Lacy had sex with Thorne.”

  “We need to prove it was the night he died.” Madison pressed a fingertip on the photo of the motel room, rose from the table, and pulled her phone to her ear. “Cynthia, I need you to cross-reference something for me.”

  “SO, YOU WANT ME TO reopen a closed case?” Sergeant Winston clasped his hands and rested them on his paunch. “Richards ruled it a suicide. Sovereign didn’t turn up any evidence to indicate—”

  “Then they were both wrong.” From her peripheral, she noticed Terry turn to face her.

  They were both in the Sergeant’s office sitting across from him.

  “Two of my best were wrong, and you’re right?”

  The way his eyes trailed from her eyes to her mouth and back, to make eye contact—he assessed her in seconds. Now wasn’t the time to argue that she would also be considered one of his best.

  “Convince me.” He swiveled slightly, picked up a pen from the desk and tapped its end on the surface.

  She ran through the evidence as they saw it, presenting the list of possible people who would have wanted Thorne dead.

  “Everyone was after this guy?” He moved his chair closer to his desk, dropped the pen, and clasped his hands again.

  “I’m not saying every—”

  “You’re not even sure and you want the case reopened? Why even come to me at this point? Investigate it on your own. You normally make your own rules.”

  Madison took a deep breath. Maybe she deserved that. She had recently gone against dir
ection and almost lost her job for it. The one thing that steadied her was that her actions had been justified.

  “Okay, listen—”

  “I have been listening, Knight. He slept with the young girl. So what? It doesn’t mean he was killed for it.”

  “If you saw this guy—Hennessey—you would know that he was possessive of her. Hell, Higgins had been out to her place.”

  “Please don’t swear in here.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me. The truth of the matter is, everything is too coincidental. I don’t—”

  “I know, you don’t like coincidences.”

  “Even you have to agree with me. It seems highly plausible our guy may not have killed himself.” Madison was slowly losing the Sergeant’s attention. “Evidence may lean toward Lacy pulling the trigger on herself, but she didn’t bury herself. The evidence also shows a struggle. This guy Thorne appears to have committed suicide, but he may have been helped along too.”

  She watched, as her argument sunk into her superior’s mind. His eyes met hers after a quick glance at Terry.

  “It looks bad on the department to make one conclusion and then reopen.”

  Leave it to Winston to be worried about how the media may spin things.

  “Isn’t it more important to get to the truth? And people do it all the time.”

  “Here we don’t.” He paused. “If I recall correctly, wasn’t there also a note?”

  “There was an e-mail that was taken as such.”

  “Taken as such?”

  “That’s what I said.” She noticed the Sergeant’s brow lower from the attitude she served back to him. “Yeah, an e-mail. Suicides are usually decided at the moment. Even if planned, it doesn’t mean one will go through with it. Execution to go ahead is statistically a quick decision.”

  “Continue.”

  “Even if Thorne had rented the room for the purpose of taking his life that night, it didn’t mean he would follow through.”

  “What are you saying to me? Plain English.”

  She fought to suppress the anger she felt beneath the surface—the anger that came as the result of not being deemed vital to the department. The mistrust that seemed to originate from the fact that she wore a bra.

  “In plain English, the e-mail taken as a suicide note was written the day before. But its wording has room for interpretation. It was an e-mail from Thorne to his fiancée saying he was stressed out and couldn’t take it anymore.” Madison gripped the arm of the chair. “I’ve been in that place before, not able to take it anymore, but it didn’t mean I was going to kill myself. And the fact is that the e-mail came from Thorne’s work account. Get this. One of the motivations that helped support the conclusion of suicide was the fact Thorne was stressed out because he lost his job and was getting married. He wasn’t fired until the next day.”

  “He sensed it coming,” Winston said.

  “Listen, boss, you know it’s too thin to be taken as a suicide note, and the entire thing is too coincidental. I can see it in your eyes.”

  “Should have known that you would analyze me too.”

  Why? Because it’s my job to analyze people? She restrained herself from verbalizing the thought.

  “Here’s the thing, I authorize your looking deeper into this.” He looked at Terry. “And I can see merit in doing so.”

  Madison straightened in her chair, drawing the Sergeant’s eyes back to her.

  “But until you get me more than the fact they had sex and they both happen to be dead a month later, the case remains closed. You hear me?”

  Madison smiled. “Yes. Of course.”

  “Now, get to work.” The Sergeant gave them both a once over and dismissed them with a brush of the hand.

  -

  Chapter 30

  PARADISE MOTEL WAS ON THE main strip in the east end. The street was lined with motels whose décor all dated back decades. Swimming pools were outlined by chain-link fences and sat in the middle of most properties. The one where Thorne had met his death didn’t have a pool. At quick count, twenty rooms squared off the parking lot. The huge sign out front read HONEYMOON ROOM WITH A HEART-SHAPED BED AVAILABLE.

  They went in and asked for Sheila Bolton, the housekeeper who found Thorne, and were told that her shift ended hours ago.

  “The maids clean from eight to one.” The guy behind the counter didn’t seem to fit in here. He wore high-end clothing and his hair was cut in a modern style. “It doesn’t take them too long.”

  “What about Lance Ringwood?” Madison asked. He was the manager of record.

  “Oh no, you won’t find him around here. He runs this place from a distance.” The guy leaned on the counter. “He actually owns several properties, and this one, let’s just say, isn’t his pride and joy.”

  “All right, then. What’s your name?”

  “Trevor.” It took sustained eye contact, but he eventually volunteered his last name. “Trevor Whitmore.”

  “You do know that a body was found in one of your rooms?” Madison assessed his reaction to the news. What she expected and what she received were two different things. His eyes widened and he stood straight.

  “A body? When? I didn’t hear…” He shook his head. “A body?” He looked back at her.

  “How long have you worked here?”

  “Two months. When did this—the body—when was it found?” He swallowed audibly.

  Madison gave him the specific date and then summed it up. “About one month ago.”

  “I had no idea. Someone killed someone? Here?”

  The latter of his statement gave way to a latent excitement.

  Trust me, in real life, murder isn’t what it’s like on TV.

  “You’ve been working here for two months but never heard of this.” Madison studied his eyes, beneath them his arms, looking for track marks, any way to connect him visually to the wrong crowd, the group Lacy had been a part of. He looked clean. The other thought on her mind was why he hadn’t been questioned before now. Even if he weren’t on shift the day Thorne was found, all staff should have been contacted and questioned. Madison pulled out a picture of Thorne. “Do you recognize him?”

  The guy took the photo from her and nodded. “Yeah, I do.” His hand shook. “This is the guy? This is the body that was—”

  “Yes.”

  He looked at her, his eyes clearly marked with disbelief. “Kevin Thorne.”

  Madison and Terry shared a look.

  “You were on a first and last name basis?” Madison asked.

  “The guy was a regular. Every Thursday night, since I started working here anyway.”

  The body was found on Friday morning. “Did he meet up with anyone on these nights?”

  “Yeah, all the time. She was a pretty thing. Really skinny. She had bones popping out of everywhere.”

  Madison pulled out a photo of Lacy and placed it on the counter. “Was it her?”

  The guy exchanged photos, leaving the one of Thorne on the counter.

  “Yeah, that’s her.”

  “Did you know her?”

  “Did? She’s dead too?”

  Madison gave a slow nod.

  “Oh my God!” One hand went to his mouth. Tears formed at the corners of his eyes.

  “You were close?”

  “No…no.” He attempted to compose himself with a shaking of the head. He dropped his hand from his mouth and crossed his arms. This time he also rubbed his arms.

  “You seem to be awfully upset about this for not knowing her.”

  “She was always,” he choked back on saliva, “happy.”

  “Happy has you this upset?”

  He walked out from behind the counter and dropped into one of two sofa chairs that served as the lobby.

  “We talked a few times. She had things
rough, she said, but they were getting better. People were starting to believe in her again.”

  “She told all this to you, a stranger?”

  “Yeah.” His eyes read, I don’t care if you believe me.

  “Continue.”

  “Well, that’s about it. She said she had a boyfriend who didn’t treat her right, but she was trying to get out of it. But there was something about the way she said it, you know. Like she wanted to believe it but didn’t really. Almost as if by saying it, it would make it a reality.”

  Madison asked him where he was the night of Thorne’s death.

  “You think I killed him?”

  “His death was actually ruled a suicide.”

  His shoulders relaxed. “I was off that entire week and didn’t come back ’til the following Monday. My baby sister was getting married. It was a big deal. It was five hours from here. A whole week of listening to ‘No, no, I love you more.’ Some couples make me sick.”

  It was possible that this guy never heard of the dead body, but Madison found it strange that the rumor hadn’t circulated back to him when he had returned. “We’ll have to check out what you’re saying—”

  “What, like it’s an alibi, like I have something to hide?”

  “Well, if you don’t, it shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “I’ll get you her number.”

  -

  Chapter 31

  AFTER SPEAKING WITH TREVOR WHITMORE, they gained access to room five, where Thorne had been found. The room wasn’t rented out so they struck it lucky, as the clerk had said.

  “I find it hard to believe he never heard about this.” Her line of thought changed when she put the key in the door and gave the handle a twist. “They haven’t even upgraded to swipe locks here.”

  “It’s like the dino era.”