Cut to the Quick

by Dianne Emley

  Kissick loomed over him. “Okay, Dillon, this is what’s going to happen. You’ll go to trial and you’ll be convicted. Your attorney will make a lot of money, but you’ll go to prison. They’ll put you on a train and take you to San Quentin and put you on death row. When you’re laying on that table waiting for the needle, Detective Ruiz and I won’t be there. Your parents will be there, outside the window, but you’ll be on that table alone. Is that what you want?”

  Somerset tightly squeezed the bottle cap between his fingers, bending the hard plastic.

  “We’re trying to help you out, Dillon,” Ruiz said. “Tell us why you confessed.”

  “Are you dense?” Somerset said. “I confessed because I did it.”

  “I need to take a break.” Kissick left the room.

  Ruiz followed.

  * * *

  In the adjoining room, crowded around the two-way glass, were Sergeant Early, Lieutenant Beltran, and Vining.

  “What do you think, guys?” Beltran asked Ruiz and Kissick.

  Ruiz took a handkerchief from his back pocket and used it to blot his nearly bald head. “After a couple of hours of working on him, he won’t retract his confession. That tells me all I need to know. That tells me he’s our guy.”

  “I can’t get past his problem with the facts,” Kissick said.

  “He talked about using a chain saw to dismember Mercer,” Ruiz protested. “That’s factual.”

  “He could have figured that out,” Kissick argued. “He saw the little bits of flesh all over the room and the blood splatter pattern. What about Mercer’s body parts? He said he stacked them. They weren’t arbitrarily stacked. They were carefully arranged. What about Mercer’s face being painted with blood? And how about the bloody footprint made by a size eleven high heel?”

  Ruiz folded the handkerchief and shoved it back inside his pocket. “But he said he only dismembered Mercer and not Richards, which is accurate.”

  “I attribute that to him not being able to imagine her body being desecrated,” Kissick said. “His description of what happened to Richards is wrong. That’s what tells me he’s lying.”

  “He was in some sort of a psychotic state when he did it,” Ruiz said. “In his mind, that’s how it happened.”

  “I agree,” Beltran said.

  “He’s a nut,” Kissick said. “But he’s not our nut.”

  “Jim, how do you explain finding a key piece of evidence in his closet?” Beltran asked. “If the blood on that athletic shoe matches one of the victim’s, that proves this isn’t a false confession.”

  Early added, “It shows he was in the murder house before he set up his shrine there.”

  “How long are we going to keep working him?” Ruiz asked. “Let’s charge him with the murders.”

  “I was just talking to Carmen Vidal,” Beltran said. “She’s madder than hell, having to sit in the lobby.” He laughed. “I don’t know what she has to complain about. It looks like she’s opened up an office. Got her papers spread out, her Blackberry and everything.”

  “I don’t know what she has to complain about either,” Early said. “She’s probably being paid six hundred dollars an hour to sit there.”

  Kissick let his eyes light upon Vining’s.

  She guessed what he was thinking. They could both see Lieutenant Beltran planning the press conference over which he’d preside like a conquering hero. One of the commanders was retiring and everyone knew that Beltran considered himself the heir apparent.

  Vining turned and left without explanation.

  “Somerset is hiding something, but he’s not our killer. I’m not ready to charge him with the murders yet.” Kissick stepped away from the group, as if anticipating the onslaught that was about to be directed at him. He wished Vining would return to help back him up and wondered why she’d abandoned him.

  Beltran was first, keeping his voice low. “All due respect, Corporal, but why would he confess to two murders he didn’t commit and not retract the confession after hours of being grilled?”

  “Lieutenant, I don’t know.”

  Vining returned carrying a large, manila evidence envelope. “I had a thought. Mind if I take a turn with Somerset?”

  Ruiz didn’t immediately respond, not wanting to cede any potential advantage to Vining. When Kissick said, “Be our guest,” and Beltran said, “Give it a shot, Corporal,” Ruiz climbed on board. “Go ahead.”

  Vining carried the envelope into the interview room.

  TWENTY-NINE

  “I’m detective Nan Vining.”

  She garnered the brightest spark of interest from Somerset that he’d shown since the interrogation had begun.

  Taking latex gloves from her pocket, she put them on, then opened the envelope’s brass clasps. She tipped the contents onto the table. Out tumbled a small wicker box and several small manila envelopes. She moved the wicker box to the middle of the table.

  Somerset glared at the box and the small envelopes. His face and shaved head grew pink.

  Vining took the lid off the box. “We found this among your possessions at Oliver Mercer’s house. All these items were in it.”

  Somerset said through gritted teeth, “Don’t touch that. That’s mine.”

  “I know it’s yours,” Vining said.

  Vining opened one of the envelopes and took out a white terrycloth headband. “What’s this, Dillon?”

  “That’s Lauren’s. It’s mine.”

  “Where did you get it?”

  Somerset’s face grew more flushed and he didn’t answer.

  Vining answered for him. “Lauren’s mother said that Lauren used to wear headbands like this at the gym. She probably dropped it on the way to her car.”

  “Give it to me.” Somerset held out his hand.

  “Sorry.” Vining set it inside the wicker box. She opened and upended another envelope, spilling the contents into her palm. She held up the stub of a movie ticket and read the information on it. “One ticket to an animated kids’ movie. Sunday matinee. You went by yourself to this, didn’t you, Dillon? You followed Lauren when she took her kids, didn’t you?”

  “I don’t like you touching my things.” Somerset rubbed his hands over the top of his head.

  Kissick silently slipped inside the room and stood near Somerset.

  “Bet Lauren was real happy having you in the theater with her kids.” Vining put the ticket stub inside the box.

  Still holding his head, his elbows on the table, Somerset said, “I watched over her. That’s mine. Don’t touch it.”

  “Now, I’d really like to know what’s behind this.” Vining emptied a small envelope onto the large one. Tiny oval scraps of paper tumbled out. She began turning them over. They were the missing heads cut from the photos of Lauren they’d found in Somerset’s apartment.

  Somerset bolted from his chair and began to lunge for the severed heads. “Those are mine!”

  Kissick grabbed his shoulders and pushed him back down.

  “She can’t touch those,” Somerset complained, pointing at Vining.

  Kissick left his one hand on Somerset’s shoulder, reminding him that he was still there.

  Vining left the severed heads where they were—tiny smiling Laurens, over and over. On top of them she poured out the contents of more envelopes. One held a brightly colored grosgrain ribbon. Another held a dried rosebud. Another held a ticket from a parking valet.

  “What about this, Dillon?” she asked. “And this? And this?”

  Somerset kept repeating, “It’s mine. It’s Lauren’s. It’s mine.”

  Vining dumped out the last envelope. It held an acrylic fingernail, painted with coral-colored polish. She picked it up in her gloved hand. It had been torn off. A patch of the wearer’s real fingernail adhered to the glue.

  “It’s mine, it’s Lauren’s, it’s—”

  Vining held it toward Somerset. “This is not Lauren’s.”

  “Yes, it is. It’s Lauren’s. It’s mine.”
<
br />   Vining still held up the fingernail. “Where did you get this, Dillon?”

  Somerset slid his hands toward his treasures.

  Kissick again seized his shoulder. “Don’t move.”

  Somerset looked at Vining. Tears were in his eyes. “They’re mine. They’re Lauren’s. They’re all I have left.”

  “Tell me where you got this fingernail, Dillon, and you can have them.” She did not intend to return the items to him.

  He blinked away tears. “In the house. I took it off Lauren’s body. I took it from her hand.”

  “No you didn’t, Dillon. You didn’t take it from her hand. Lauren’s fingernails were short and had clear polish. Why are you pretending that you killed her?”

  “Because I loved her. If anyone was going to kill her, it should have been me.”

  “But it wasn’t you.”

  He hung his head. “I wanted to protect her and make life beautiful for her. If she had to be murdered, I should have done it, to protect her.”

  Vining began picking up Somerset’s mementos and returning them to the small envelopes.

  He didn’t protest. His terrible secret now out, he seemed broken. He wiped his nose on his sleeve and rubbed his hand over his eyes. “Can I go now?”

  Kissick had moved away from him. “No, you can’t go. You broke into Oliver Mercer’s house. You lied to us. That’s not trivial.”

  “I guess maybe I need an attorney.”

  Vining looked at him. “Are you asking for an attorney?”

  “Yes. And I need something to eat. I have low blood sugar issues.”

  After a break during which Somerset had an organic fruit and nut bar, he had calmed down sufficiently to tell his story.

  After a long negotiation, Vidal, Kissick, Ruiz, and a prosecutor from the D.A.’s Pasadena office reached an agreement. In exchange for Somerset’s complete and truthful account about how blood ended up on his Nike shoe and how he had come by the acrylic fingernail, the D.A. would not charge Dillon with burglary, usually filed as a felony, or the less-serious charges of making false statements to the police and vandalism. Somerset then detailed each occasion he’d entered Mercer’s house. There had been several.

  The day the murders were discovered, the PPD had brought Somerset in for questioning, starting his downward spiral. In the wee hours of the next morning, he gave in to his impulse to again visit Mercer’s house—the scene of both Richards’s betrayal of him and her murder. The sprinklers had been on in Mercer’s yard. Somerset’s damp tennis shoes on the bloody floor transferred blood to the sole of his Nike.

  When he saw the crime scene, Somerset unraveled. He went home, gathered his camping gear, changed into hiking boots, leaving the bloody Nike beside the bed, and returned to Mercer’s with no plans for the future other than never leaving Richards’s side again.

  Somerset had found the acrylic fingernail among sprays of white freesias in a vase on a sideboard in Mercer’s living room. When Somerset had pulled out the flowers to incorporate them into his shrine around the blood-soaked living room floor, the torn acrylic fingernail had fallen out. Somerset believed the nail was Richards’s, although he didn’t recall her using something so artificial to enhance her appearance. He saw it as the corrupting influence of Oliver Mercer.

  Vidal and the D.A. finally agreed to charge Somerset only with trespassing, a misdemeanor. At arraignment, the D.A. would recommend that Somerset pay a nominal fine and be released.

  As Vidal led her client from the interview room, Kissick remarked to Vining, “You said Bowie Crowley wasn’t your type. How about this guy? He’s single now.”

  Vining looked deeply into his eyes. She opened her mouth as if to speak, but then turned away, saying nothing.

  THIRTY

  With Somerset no longer a suspect, the PPD turned its full attention to Jack Jenkins. Caspers, Ruiz, Jones, and Sproul set about following the paper trail and tracking down people who knew Jenkins. Vining and Kissick would return to the Salton Sea to surveil Jenkins’s Stop ’N Go Market, hoping Jack would show up. Ideally, they would pick up a discarded cigarette butt, coffee cup, or something else that might carry his DNA, preferably obtained legally. The torn acrylic fingernail with the patch of DNA-laden real nail attached was already on its way for DNA testing. With any luck, they would also find skin cells or blood from Mercer or Richards.

  Kissick had finished arrangements to borrow a car from Narcotics/Vice to take to the Salton Sea when Caspers approached his cubicle.

  “I have a piece of business with you, Corporal Kissick,” Caspers began.

  “Shoot.”

  “Squatting dog …” Caspers turned around and lifted his dress shirt and T-shirt, displaying the tattooed Chinese calligraphy on his back.

  “Squatting dog?” Kissick repeated, seemingly perplexed.

  “Don’t bullshit me, man.” Caspers tucked in his shirt.

  Vining walked up and joined the exchange.

  Kissick stifled a smile. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Look how he laughs,” said Caspers. “You so know what I’m talking about.”

  Vining chuckled too. “What’s going on?”

  Caspers continued riding Kissick. “I’ve asked two reliable sources about my tattoo. Both confirm that it says Crouching Tiger, not Squatting Dog.” He pointed accusingly at Kissick. “You got Cameron Lam to—”

  “Is that what Lam told you your tattoo says?” Kissick asked. “Squatting Dog?”

  Vining cracked up.

  Caspers continued pointing at Kissick. “I’m gonna get you, but good.”

  After shaking his finger one more time, Caspers left.

  As soon as he did, Kissick wrestled harder with his laughter.

  Still chuckling, Vining leaned in closer. “You had Cam Lam tell him his tattoo says Squatting Dog?”

  Kissick succumbed, laughing as quietly as he could manage. Tears sprang into his eyes.

  Vining raised her palm and Kissick high-fived her. Her cell phone began ringing. She took it from her pocket and looked at the display. She didn’t recognize the number, but her interest was piqued by the area code: 213. Downtown L.A.

  “This is Nan Vining.”

  “This is Leo Chapel. The psych tech down at County Hospital.”

  He didn’t need to explain who he was.

  “Yes?” she asked.

  “Your guy was released.”

  “What?” Vining felt the air sucked out of her.

  “About two this afternoon.”

  Vining looked at her watch. It was after 9:00 at night. Mindful of Kissick nearby, she walked away from the cubicles. “You said you’d call me.”

  “I just started my shift. I didn’t think they’d cut him loose so soon.”

  “Why did they?”

  “He started talking. From what I’ve been told, when the psychiatrist on duty was making his rounds, he stopped by Nitro’s bed and asked how he was doing. Nitro said, ‘I’m fine.’ The doctor pulled over a chair and they had a chat.”

  “Did Nitro say why he wouldn’t talk before?”

  “I read the doctor’s notes in Nitro’s chart. He wrote that the patient reported suffering from personal problems, was upset, and just didn’t care about anything, so he stopped talking. He was sorry for the trouble he caused and wants to go home.”

  “What name did he sign on the release papers?”

  “Nitro.”

  Vining closed her eyes. “Do you know if anybody picked him up?”

  “My buddy who was here said he made a call from the phone in the ward, but didn’t think anyone came inside to get him. He walked out and that was that.”

  “Thanks for calling,” Vining said flatly.

  “Not so fast. What about the hundred you’d said you’d give me?”

  “You were supposed to call me when he was going to be released, not seven hours later.”

  “I told you he was gone by the time my shift started. I got all this information fo
r you. That ought to be worth something.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Look, bitch. There’s something here you’ll want. We found it after Nitro left. Turned up at the reception desk.”

  “What is it?”

  “An envelope that looks like it has a card in it, like an invitation. Handwriting on it says: ‘Please deliver to Officer Vining, Pasadena Police Department.’ ”

  Officer Vining. That’s what T. B. Mann called her.

  “If you want it, it’ll be two hundred bucks.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I was going to give it to you when you came to pay me the hundred, but since you’ve been such a bitch … Take it or leave it.”

  “I’ll be right down.”

  “I’ll meet you in the parking lot in front of the E.R.”

  Kissick caught up with Vining while she was grabbing her purse from her locked desk drawer.

  “I’m good to drive out to the Salton Sea whenever,” he said. “If we went now, we’d beat the traffic. Get a couple of rooms nearby for the night. Something wrong?”

  She slipped the strap of her purse over her shoulder. “Nitro was released at two o’clock this afternoon.”

  “They cut him loose? Why?”

  She told him what the psych tech had said.

  “So Nitro was faking,” Kissick said. “What was that all about?”

  “Who knows?”

  “Why did this psych tech bother to call you?”

  “Because someone left a letter for me down at the Big G.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know, Jim. I have to go down and find out.”

  “You going now?”

  “Yes.” She started walking toward the door.

  He grabbed his jacket and followed. “Not alone.”

  “Jim, it’s not a problem. I’ll just pick up the letter and leave.” She saw where this was heading. She didn’t want him to go with her and stumble upon the true extent of her dealings with Chapel. Specifically, how she had confiscated Nitro’s pearl necklace.

  She continued walking.

  He put his hand on her shoulder.

  She turned, glaring first at his hand on her, then at him.