Fatal Lies ( Lies Mystery Thriller Series Book 2)

by Andrew Cunningham

  “Driver, lie down on the road with your hands behind your back. Passenger, move slowly around the back of the car and lie down next to the driver with your hands behind your back.

  I laid down and did as they said. A minute later I heard Sabrina lie down beside me.

  “Del, I’m scared.”

  “So am I. What did we do?”

  “Don’t say anything unless they ask you a direct question,” she whispered.

  I heard the sound of numerous people running and a second later felt a knee in my back and the cold metal of handcuffs on my wrists. I let out a cry as the handcuffs were closed. They were tight and it felt like one of them was pinching my skin. I heard a groan come from Sabrina.

  “Sabrina, are you okay?” My head was turned away from her, so I couldn’t see what they were doing.

  “Shut up! Not a word from you.”

  Someone lifted me up and leaned me against the car.

  “Delmore Honeycutt?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are under arrest for the murder of Lucas Holt.”

  Chapter 21

  Everything after that was a blur. I think they read me my rights. I think they asked Sabrina her name, but I don’t know if she gave it. I think they said a whole bunch of other things to me, but I have no idea. I don’t know if my mind just shut down, or what. I remember being in the police car—they had put Sabrina in a separate car—and I remember being walked into the police station. They booked me, took my picture—I now understood why mug shots look so bad. You’re really not at your best—then they put me in a room by myself, where I waited … a long time.

  If they were hoping that two hours by myself in a room would freak me out to the point of confessing something, they had picked the wrong guy. The time to talk to me would have been the moment we arrived at the station. That was when I was most scared. Giving me time alone meant giving me time to think, and the more I thought, the calmer I became.

  The fact was, I had done nothing wrong. Yeah, I know. Prison is full of people who supposedly did nothing wrong but ended up there anyway. But the longer I sat there, the more relaxed I got. There were mirrors on the wall and I had seen enough cop shows to assume that they were two-way mirrors. Were the cops watching me? After about a half hour, I really didn’t care. In the last year, I had been shot at several times and threatened repeatedly. Really, how much worse could this be? I knew that Sabrina had her super-agent on the case. I also knew that once they found out who Sabrina was, it would change everything.

  I just wished I had a baseball and glove. I could pretend I was Steve McQueen locked in the cooler in The Great Escape.

  After an hour alone I started to think about Lucas Holt. He was dead. He couldn’t have been killed very long after we left. This was why I was in this place. But who could have killed him? A random killer? Not likely. His son Jackson? He was headed to the horse barn. The people he was riding with would have vouched for him. His wife Barbara? She had my vote. But they had to have been married for fifty or sixty years. Why would she choose that moment to kill him? None of it made sense, but Barbara had my vote anyway.

  So if they were trying to intimidate me by leaving me alone, it didn’t work. Instead, at about the two-hour mark I fell asleep. Hey, it had been a long day and kinda stressful. I was tired. I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I put my head down on the table, ignoring all the snot and spit that had accumulated over the years. Somehow, I don’t think washing that table had ever been a high priority.

  I woke up with a start. More accurately, I woke up with a near-heart attack. Someone had slammed something hard and heavy right next to my head against the metal table. I was pretty sure I was having the big one.

  “Wake up, asshole.”

  Were they supposed to talk to me that way? I looked at my watch, or at least where the watch used to be—they had taken all of my belongings when they checked me in. I doubted they had let me sleep for more than a couple of minutes.

  “We have some questions for you.”

  “How nice.”

  I wasn’t exactly sure why I said that. Maybe it had something to do with being hungry, tired, thirsty, and generally pissed-off. And I had to pee really bad. Needless to say, it started things off on the wrong foot.

  “You think you’re being funny? It won’t seem so funny when you spend the rest of your life as someone’s prison bitch.”

  There were two of them and based on their expressions I didn’t think I was going to get the “good cop/bad cop” routine. The “good cop” was nowhere to be seen. I swear that the one doing the talking looked like Jack Webb of Dragnet fame. He not only looked like him, he talked like him. He was no-nonsense, monotone, and without personality. Zero. I don’t think Jack Webb ever called anyone an asshole on the show, though. The second guy had had just a few too many donuts. I doubted he could have run after a suspect for more than ten seconds without collapsing.

  Jack and the doughboy were doing their best to scare me and I had to admit it was working. The cockiness I felt earlier had degenerated into abject fear. Could I really be convicted of something I didn’t do? I was remembering the feelings I’d had about prison life when we were visiting Terri. Not so good.

  “Why did you kill Lucas Holt?”

  “I didn’t kill anyone. We went to talk to him and his wife kicked us out. End of story. Ask his son, Jackson. If we had killed Lucas Holt, we wouldn’t have spent twenty minutes standing outside the house talking to Jackson.”

  Doughboy wrote something in a notebook, crossed it out, wrote something again, and crossed it out again.

  “J-a-c-k-s-o-n,” I spelled. Okay, so not all of the cockiness had gone.

  He gave me a dirty look, then wrote something again in the book.

  “Why were you there to talk to Holt?” asked Jack.

  “It’s a long story.”

  “We have time.”

  Wait a minute! Wasn’t I entitled to have a lawyer present? Of course I was. And if I had to guess, that’s what Sabrina’s super-agent was probably arranging. I didn’t have to talk to them.

  “I want my lawyer.”

  Oh, how cops must hate those words. They gave me the stare of death, then turned around and walked out without another word.

  I still had to pee.

  A few minutes later a couple of uniformed cops came to get me and took me down to a holding cell. They seemed like decent guys, but I would never know because they didn’t say anything the whole time.

  The cell wasn’t too bad. At least I didn’t have some drunk biker cellmate. I was given a single, but I think that was only because it was a slow day. Of the eight cells, only three were occupied, and the other two besides mine had what looked to be drunks sleeping it off.

  The good news was that the cell had a toilet. The bad news was that it was out for everyone to see. Good thing I only had to pee.

  I had no idea what time it was. The holding cell lacked a clock. It had to be at least mid-evening though. If that was the case, I was pretty sure I wasn’t going anywhere until morning. I laid down on the cot, hoping it wasn’t crawling with bedbugs, but I couldn’t sleep. I had passed my window for sleeping with my two-minute nod-off on the metal table.

  I thought again of Lucas Holt. I can’t say that I felt particularly bad for the guy. From what we could determine, he was a thoroughly despicable human being. On the other hand, he was well into dementia, and I wouldn’t want to wish that on anyone. I wished that someone had given me even a little bit of information. What time was he killed? Were we already at Wheeler’s house when it happened? Where was Sabrina? Were they subjecting her to some of the same tactics? Somehow I doubted it.

  The cot was really uncomfortable and I found myself pacing the cell. I decided that there was nothing worse than not knowing. At least give me a hint. After I had been in there about an hour, a guard brought me some McDonalds. It was cold, but I didn’t care. A couple of cheeseburgers, a large fries, and a lukewarm, watered down Coke. The i
ce had long-since melted. I scarfed it down, just appreciating having something in my stomach.

  In the end, it was Senator John Wheeler who saved our butts. Well, mine. Sabrina was never under suspicion. Sabrina’s super-agent (Steve Rogers was his name—wasn’t that Captain America’s real name? That would figure.) had contacted a lawyer friend in the Pittsburgh area who had gotten Sabrina released. Sabrina gave him a quick rundown of the situation. The police said that Barbara Holt had told them that I had threatened her husband and an hour after we left, someone had broken in and had caved his head in with a fireplace poker. The timeline didn’t make any sense to him and the lawyer contacted Wheeler—whom he knew—for confirmation that we had stopped by his house after visiting Holt. Wheeler not only confirmed it, but personally called the Pittsburgh police chief to let him know that there was no way I could have done it since I was with him. I had an airtight alibi.

  I knew he liked us, but my guess was that he felt that if he called and helped us, we would be less likely to reveal his secret. He needn’t have worried. We had no intention of doing so, a fact that Sabrina reiterated to him when she called to thank him.

  As a result of his phone call I didn’t have to wait until morning to be released. Sometime after midnight two guards took me up to the front desk, where I was given back my belongings and processed out, with Sam Parker, my lawyer and new best friend at my side.

  I met Sabrina in the lobby, where she was surrounded by a cadre of cops taking turns having their pictures taken with her. She didn’t seem to mind. When she saw me, she rushed over to hug me. I saw her nose twitch as she approached me, but she was too kind to tell me that I stunk. Some of the cops actually came over to shake my hand and apologize for my inconvenience. I noticed that Jack and the doughboy weren’t there.

  We checked into a hotel at 3:00am, took showers, and immediately fell asleep.

  Chapter 22

  Since meeting Sabrina, my life had been a series of firsts, and I had just added being locked up to the list. Didn’t like it and didn’t want to repeat it.

  We woke up somewhat refreshed at 8:00 and once again were at a loss for what direction to take.

  “Do you think Barbara Holt really believed that you killed Lucas?” asked Sabrina. We were sitting in a Waffle House getting our sugar fix for the morning.

  “Probably not. It must have been pretty devastating to come upon her husband with his head bashed in. Although we didn’t threaten him, he was definitely disturbed by our visit. I can understand why she would point the suspicion my way. I was convenient. I’m not sure why she didn’t accuse you, though.”

  “I’m cuter.”

  “There is that. So what do we do next?”

  “We still don’t know anything about Daisy’s life after she left Harvard. If we can find out where she lived, maybe we can find someone who knew her,” said Sabrina.

  “Ronnie can probably tell us the town. I’m not sure we will find anyone after twenty years, but you never know.”

  Before Sabrina could call, however, my phone rang. I answered it, not recognizing the number.

  “Hi, is this Del?”

  “It is.” I shrugged my shoulders at Sabrina, indicating that I had no idea who it was.

  “This is Jackson Holt. We met yesterday.”

  “I remember. I’m sorry to hear about your father. For the record, I had nothing to do with his death.” How often had I ever had to say that?

  “I know you didn’t and that’s one reason for the call, to apologize. My mother wasn’t thinking straight when she accused you. You’ll never get her to apologize, but hopefully I’m the next best thing.”

  “I appreciate the apology. It wasn’t a pleasant experience.”

  “I can only imagine. I’d like to buy the two of you lunch as a peace offering, but also because I’d like to talk to you. Would you join me for lunch?”

  I looked at Sabrina, raised my eyebrows, and said, “Sure.”

  We arranged to meet at an open air restaurant on the river at noon.

  I hung up, looked at my watch, and said, “Guess I shouldn’t have had so many waffles. Don’t know if I’ll be hungry by noon.”

  “I have faith in you,” Sabrina said. She immediately got serious. “This sounds mysterious. What are you thinking?”

  “I don’t have a clue. Is he meeting to get information from us or to give us information?”

  “In the meantime,” said Sabrina, “I’ll give Ronnie a call.”

  Ronnie was home, caring for a sick child, and seemed happy for the diversion. Sabrina stepped outside with her phone and talked to her for about fifteen minutes. Since I could only hear half the conversation, I used that time to find a bathroom. The waffles had hit hard.

  Sabrina was hanging up when I returned.

  “That was interesting,” she said. She looked around. “Can we find a park? I need some fresh air and nature.”

  I called it up on GPS and found a nature preserve just a couple of miles away.

  Sabrina talked as we drove. “She was only eight when her life exploded, so her memory has faded somewhat, but it’s amazing what the mind retains, and eight isn’t that young. She was actually born in Arizona and lived her first six years there. Almost all of her good memories are of Arizona. She said they were happy there and she remembers having a lot of friends. I guess the move to Pennsylvania—somewhere outside Philadelphia—was pretty hard for both her and her mother. She said her mother seemed nervous all the time.”

  We parked at the nature preserve and got out of the car. It smelled like newly cut grass.

  “That makes sense,” I said. “If Daisy was trying to escape her parents, moving back to Pennsylvania, even the other side of the state, must have been nerve-wracking. I’d be nervous too.”

  “I wonder why she didn’t just refuse to go and tell her husband to look for something that wasn’t in or near Pennsylvania.”

  “If I had to guess—based on something Ronnie said later in the conversation—I’d say she never told her husband about her family.”

  “How do you keep something like that a secret from your spouse?”

  “Based on things I heard in prison from lots of people, a lot of marriages have secrets that are never revealed.”

  “Well, you know all of my secrets,” I said, “not that I had any.”

  “And you now know all of mine,” replied Sabrina. “And I had a lot.”

  It suddenly occurred to me that those statements followed a line about marriage. Were we both hinting? I felt myself flush, and glanced at Sabrina. She was looking down at her feet, but her cheeks were red. We were. I felt butterflies in my stomach. It was a nice feeling.

  “It sounds like it was all really sad,” continued Sabrina. “She was at school when her father was killed. Her mom had already been taken away. She saw her mom a few times before the trial, but she had been placed with her grandparents by then. She remembers her grandfather saying later on, when she was a lot older, that her mom told him that if anyone ever came to him and asked about Daisy, to deny ever knowing her. Ronnie said her grandfather was told that they were an evil family and to keep Ronnie away from them.”

  “Was he ever approached?”

  “Not to Ronnie’s knowledge. In fact, she said that Daisy never told them who might come asking. She never told them her former name. That’s why I don’t think she revealed it to her husband either. Ronnie said they lived in Phoenix. We can check it out at some point.”

  “We know that Barbara and the recently departed Lucas were evil, but what about Jackson?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. I got pretty good vibes from him.”

  “So did I. We don’t know if the story got a little smudged in the retelling. It may not have been the whole family who was bad.”

  “Nevertheless,” said Sabrina. “We might not want to go overboard with Jackson. He seems okay, but we really don’t know him. Let’s not give any more information than we have to.”

  We spe
nt a couple of hours walking and sitting in the sun. At 11:30, we left the preserve to meet Jackson.

  The restaurant was a trendy place that seemed to cater to young successful businesspeople, or young wannabe successful businesspeople. I could predict that, in another year, the successful people would have moved on to a newer and better place, and the restaurant we were in would become strictly a wannabe restaurant. Eventually it would lose even that status as the wannabes would try to follow their idols, and it would become just another run-of-the-mill restaurant. I was amazed at my ability to see into the future.

  Jackson was already there waiting for us. He had secured a table at the edge of the deck overlooking the river. He stood as we approached and shook our hands when we reached the table.

  “Thanks for coming,” he said as we sat. He focused in on Sabrina and said, “So you’re really a bestselling author. I’ve read about you. You have quite the story.”

  “One that I do everything in my power to forget,” she answered.

  He took the hint.

  “I don’t doubt it. Well, I’m honored to be sitting with someone so universally beloved. That must make you feel good.”

  “Honestly? I just like to write books.”

  End of subject.

  “As I said on the phone,” he said, shifting his attention to me, “I wanted to take this time to apologize to you for what my mother put you through.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “It wasn’t pleasant, but it’s over now. How’s your mom doing?” Not that I cared.

  “It’s hard. They were married a long time. But she’s tough. She’ll get over it.” I noticed that he didn’t say it with much affection.

  “And how are you doing?” Sabrina asked.

  “I’m fine. My father and I didn’t have much of a relationship even when he was healthy. Since the Alzheimer’s set in, the relationship had become nonexistent. This sounds horrible, but I don’t even feel bad for him. Truth be told, he was an asshole and …” he let it drop. “Anyway,” he continued, “apologizing wasn’t the only reason I wanted to meet with you. I wanted to ask you a favor.”