“Well, for a while. I mean . . . yeah.”
“Was Kaiden ever there?”
“No.”
“Had he been there, could you tell?” Punch asked. “Like maybe before you and Trent got there?”
“Not sure,” Ronnie said. “And honestly, I just hit the sack. I didn’t look to see him there.”
“You don’t know where Kaiden spent the night?”
“No.”
“Do you think he might have stayed with Davonte?” Punch asked.
“He, uh, might’ve, except they were mad at each other.”
“Were they an item?”
“What? No! I mean, Davonte is gonna be in the NBA some day! He’s big-time!”
Punch looked at Ronnie for a long moment. Ronnie looked away. “Ronnie, is there something I need to know? You’re kind of protective here.”
“No. I mean, it wasn’t like that with those two,” Ronnie said, and then looked at his phone. “I gotta get to class.”
“Ronnie, were you surprised when Kaiden didn’t make it home?”
“No.”
“Did you think he was with Davonte?”
“Well, yeah—but not in the way you mean,” Ronnie said, standing and gathering his gear. He was buttoning his coat when he stopped suddenly and looked down at Punch. “I mean, Davonte followed him outside. He said . . .”
“Said what?” Punch asked. He waited while Ronnie debated answering, then softly repeated, “Said what?”
“He said he was going to beat Kaiden’s ass,” Ronnie said, looking around him. “Detective Polson, does my dad need to know?”
“Know what?” Punch asked, turning both palms upward and shrugging.
“Thanks, Detective Polson.” Ronnie cracked the briefest of smiles. “I gotta go.”
“Go,” Punch said, and waved him off, admiring a couple of very attractive young women walking by, talking and laughing. He was in no hurry to drive in the snow.
7
The next day, Punch and Jensen were back at the college under Richter’s escort. This time they were in the dorms to visit Davonte Blair. Punch knocked at the door, then repeated the knock and listened closely. Eventually, the door opened.
“Mr. Blair? I’m Detective Polson and this is Corporal Jensen,” Punch said through the crack of the door, flashing his badge. “We’d like to talk with you if you have a minute.”
“What about?” Devonte answered.
“How about you let us in, and we’ll explain?” Punch asked, and then turned to Richter. “You might want to leave this to us. Else you might have to make an arrest.”
“Huh?” Richter said.
“What if I don’t?” Davonte asked.
“Well, Mr. Blair, if you don’t let us in, then I guess I’m gonna have to go and get a warrant so I can investigate what I think is the smell of raw marijuana,” Punch said. He made a show of sniffing, then turned and looked at Jensen. “Can you smell what I smell?”
“Oh, yessir,” Jensen said. “I smell the strong odor of raw marijuana emanating from Room Number A12.”
Richter was walking down the hallway as fast as he could. Punch smiled and turned back to the door, which was now open. Davonte stood just inside, looking down at the six-foot Punch and the slightly shorter Jensen. “Come in,” he said in a deep baritone.
“Why, thank you, Mr. Blair,” Punch said. He quickly scanned the room. It looked like dorm rooms he’d been in before, except for a six-inch-high stack of letters piled at the foot of the bed. Many of them were unopened, and most were outwardly adorned with the logo of an athletically prestigious university. “Can we sit down?”
“Make yourself at home, cop.”
“Why, thank you, Mr. Blair,” Punch said, and with the back of his hand vigorously swept the letters off the bed. Settling in, he looked at Davonte and smiled. “You know Kaiden Miles?”
Davonte stared at Punch until he realized Punch wasn’t going to look elsewhere. “Sure. He’s our manager.”
“You know him off the court?”
“We hung out a little bit, yeah,” Davonte said. “What’s it to you?”
“You know he’s missing?”
“I know he ain’t been around.”
“His roommate—Ronnie Norquist, you know him, right?” Punch asked.
“He’s a manager, too.”
“Ronnie reported Kaiden missing a couple of days ago.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Ronnie says you and him and Kaiden and Trent Gustafson were partying the other night.”
“That’s what he said?” Davonte was looking at an expensive athletic shoe, rolling it back and forth in his enormous hands.
“That’s what he said,” Punch said. “Says the four of you vaped a little weed and played some video games. Says you and Kaiden got in a little disagreement. Says Kaiden got pissed and left.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Punch said. “And here’s where it gets interesting: he says that a few minutes after Kaiden left, you got dressed, said you were gonna go kick Kaiden’s ass, and you left, too.”
“He said that?”
Punch ignored him. “Now, you’re a college man, and I’m just a cop. But I’m sure you understand why I would find that of interest, right? I mean, Ronnie saw Kaiden leave, then you leave . . . and then Kaiden disappears.”
“Sounds like Ronnie’s been talking a lot.” The big man’s hands were still now.
“Enough.” Punch nodded. “And if all that’s true, I’m thinking that you were the last person to see Kaiden.” Punch used the toe of his boot to move a discarded towel that was lying on the floor. Underneath, he could see marijuana shake on the carpet. “So, since I’m looking for Kaiden, I thought, ‘What better place to start than with Mr. Blair, who appears to have been the last guy to be seen with him?’”
“I don’t know nothin’,” Davonte said, shaking his head and then running a hand over his face, top to bottom.
“Were you with those guys that night?”
“I can’t remember,” Davonte said.
“Did you have a disagreement with Kaiden?”
“No.”
“Threaten to kick his ass?”
“No.”
“Did you follow Kaiden?” Punch pressed.
“No,” Davonte repeated.
Punch and Davonte looked at each other, expressionless. “I’ve already looked at the video on campus, and I know he left and then you left, and I’m thinking you were following him.” Punch watched the big man closely. “What’s got me curious is why you are lying to me now.”
“I don’t know what happened to that dude, man.”
“So, what happened?” Punch said. “When’s the last time you saw him?”
“I ain’t answering no more questions without a lawyer, man.”
“Jensen, you still smell what I smell?”
“I do, Punch,” Jensen said. “In fact, the smell is getting stronger. I think it’s coming from that Crown Royal bag right next to you. In fact, I’ll bet if you stood up, you could see in there without touching anything.”
“And if I did that, then—”
“Then you’d probably have probable cause for a warrant to search, boss.”
“How do you think those big colleges would feel about a recruit getting busted for weed?”
“Well,” Jensen said, tipping his hat back, “what I hear is they are getting real sensitive to the use of illegal drugs or other lawbreaking by prospective players. I think that might dissuade some of them. Did I use ‘dissuade’ right, boss? Because I never went to college either, you know.”
“You did fine,” Punch said, looking to Davonte, who was studying the floor. “Hey, Jensen. Someone told me Davonte here might be a real NBA prospect. What do you hear about the draft prospects of guys busted for drugs?”
“I hear it results in a guy losing several positions in the draft, or even dropping out of the draft entirely,” Jensen said. “Could cost a guy millions, is what
I hear.”
“Wow. That’d be a shame.” Punch shook his head sadly and watched Davonte do the math.
“All right, cop. I seen ’em all that night,” Davonte said, standing and beginning to pace the room. “We vaped a little weed, played some war game on the box, then he left. I left after that to go see one of my teammates.”
“Alone?”
“Alone.”
“Where was he going?” Punch interrupted.
“I don’t know. We had a little argument and he left.”
“What time was that?”
“I don’t know. I was wasted, man.” Davonte shook his head slightly and looked to the ceiling. “That shit he had. . .”
“So, he left and—”
“That’s it.”
“Did you two have an argument?”
“Not really. Why would I argue with him?”
“Ronnie says it was over money.”
“Ronnie needs to watch his ass.”
“Or what?” Punch asked. “He’ll disappear, too?”
“Yo, man, you listening? I just told you, I don’t know nothing about that!” Davonte stopped pacing and looked down at Punch.
“But you saw him leave?”
“I did.”
“Never saw him again?” Punch asked, looking up at the young man.
“Nope. Like I said. Kinda rode the buzz for a while. Talked with Ronnie and that Trent dude. Went to my buddy’s house. Fell asleep. Woke up a few hours later and came back here.”
“Can anyone corroborate that?” Punch asked, and then, seeing Davonte’s blank stare, rephrased the question. “Can anyone say they saw you that night—I mean after Kaiden left and you left? See anyone else?”
“Just the dude whose place I crashed,” Davonte said after a long pause.
“Never seen or heard from Kaiden since that night?”
“Never. God’s truth,” he said, and sat back down just as Punch’s neck began to cramp.
“Okay.” Punch stood. “I’m gonna go with that for right now. What’s your travel schedule?”
“Uh, we play somewhere in Idaho this weekend. Idaho one night, Utah the next, I think.”
“So, for the time being I’m going to be okay with you traveling for basketball, but other than that, I’m gonna need you to stay around here.”
“Can you do that?”
“If I have to get a court order, I will, Davonte,” Punch began. “Of course, that would involve me completing an affidavit, meaning I’d have to spell out everything I know, including you hanging with a bunch of dudes getting high. Know what I mean?”
“I’ll be around, cop,” Davonte said. “Just be cool.”
“Oh, I will be,” Punch said. “One last question.”
“Yeah?”
“Where’d you get those cuts on your hands?”
“Games, man,” Davonte said, turning his hands and looking at them. “These guys can’t stop me, so they hack me.”
“Mind if Jensen here takes a couple of pictures?”
“Why?”
“Why not?”
“Go ahead, man,” Davonte said, putting his hands in front of him. “Then get on out of here.”
Punch hadn’t slept well and was up early. He had a bad feeling about Kaiden Miles. It had been a week since the young man’s disappearance, and people were getting antsy. According to Jensen, no activity had been observed on Miles’s phone, which was a bad sign for a guy his age. This morning, though, Punch had to testify in a drug case he’d made months ago. The plan was to get in and review the file and then get to the courthouse a little early to talk with the prosecutor. He was brushing his teeth when his phone rang. He answered lest it wake Rhonda.
“Did you hear what was on the radio just now?” It was Jensen.
“No. Rhonda’s still sleeping. What are you talking about?”
“Miles’s mom gave a radio interview to the Custer station. She is all over us for looking at this as a missing person case. She is convinced he is the victim of foul play, and she said we were flat on our asses.”
“Good God almighty!” Punch said, then took a minute to spit and rinse. “Everything we’ve got right now indicates that he took off. We don't have squat saying it was anything other than him disappearing because he wanted to.”
“I know that, boss. You know that. But she is convinced that it’s foul play. She’s pointing out that he had no suicidal tendencies, that there was no note, that he had good grades last semester, and that he had told her he was going to go on down to the University of Wyoming next fall.”
“What’s becoming clear to me is that she didn't know her little angel was a CI, did she?”
“I don’t think she had a clue.”
“Well, you spoke with her, didn’t you?”
“I did. She either doesn’t know anything or she’s a helluva actress.”
“Well, I’m gonna let DCI know,” Punch mused. “Maybe they can whisper in her ear, and if mom knows that the apple of her eye was a drug-dealing CI, maybe we can get a little breathing room, huh?”
“Sounds good to me, boss.”
“All right, I’ll be there in a couple minutes, but I gotta get to the courthouse. I’m testifying this morning.”
“Lucky you.”
Sarah Penrose, reporter for the Custer Bugle, had been on hold, waiting for Custer Police Department Chief of Police William “Buck” Lucas for more than five minutes now. She was getting irritable and was about to hang up when she heard his deep voice. “Hello?”
“Chief Lucas, this is Sarah Penrose,” she said. “What can you tell us about the investigation?”
“Which one?”
“The one into the disappearance of Kaiden Miles.”
“I’m not prepared to comment at this time,” Lucas said.
“Can you confirm that Kaiden Miles, a student at Custer College, is missing?”
“I cannot.”
“His mother says he is missing,” Sarah said. “She said your department is failing to investigate, at least in part, because he is gay.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“So, are you saying that you are investigating his disappearance?”
“I’m not saying anything right now,” Lucas said. “We’ll have a comment later.”
Sarah sat at her desk and looked at her phone, hearing a dial tone. “This might be it,” she said.
“What was that?” asked Jimmy Brown, the paper’s photographer. He was cleaning his camera.
“If this is what I think it is, JB, you and I might be on our way to the Denver Post here soon.”
“You think this is that big?”
“I think it is huge,” Sarah said. “And even if it isn’t, I think with a little creative journalism we can make it that big. Remember Matthew Shepard?”
“I’ve heard of the case.”
“The gay University of Wyoming student killed by a couple of rednecks? This is going to be bigger. Way bigger.”
“How do you know?”
“Simple,” she said, turning to her keyboard. “I’m going to make it bigger.”
Sam was sitting in the local Veterans Administration outpatient clinic. Twice each week, he was shown to a small room with a desktop computer, a chair, and not much else. Moments later his counselor, Bob Martinez, would appear from parts unknown via video-teleconference. Sam was wandering around the tiny room when he heard Martinez’s voice. “Mr. Johnstone, how are you?”
“If I was okay would I be here seeing your sorry ass?”
“Thanks, Sam. Love you too, brother,” Martinez said, smiling. He’d been Sam’s counselor for a little more than a year now. “Seriously. How are you doing—really?”
“I’m okay,” Sam said. He took a chair.
“Okay is good,” Martinez said, making a note. “Any thoughts of harming yourself or others?”
“Was behind a guy on his phone this morning who sat through a green light. Gave some thought to cutting his thr
oat.”
“Nice. Anything else?”
“Some clown in front of me at lunch ordered a quad shot, vanilla soy something-or-other with foam and sprinkles,” Sam said. “That’s summary execution material there, right?”
Martinez laughed. “Anything else?”
“Yeah, any producer in Nashville who is cranking out this hick-hop crap I’m hearing on the country music station. I think a couple of bunker-busters would do the trick.”
“Hick-hop?” Martinez laughed aloud. “I love it! And I’m with you, for what it’s worth.” Then he turned serious. “Okay, Sam. How is it going?”
“I’m all right. Hanging in there.”
“Good. Work your program to deal with the booze and you can get better. How’s the drinking?”
“One day at a time.”
“You’re talking to me,” Martinez said. “No bullshit. Where ya at?”
“I do pretty good some days, and not so good other days.”
“How many times did you drink in the past week?”
“Three, maybe four?”
“You can’t remember?” Martinez asked.
“I’m not counting—you are,” Sam replied.
“Any blackouts?”
“No.”
“Any incidents?”
“Yeah.”
“Tell me,” Martinez said, and for the next few minutes he listened closely while Sam recounted the events at the football game. “Yeesh. What did your sponsor say?”
“We haven’t been talking.”
“Why not?”
“He relapsed,” Sam said. “I need to find a new guy, I guess.”
“Find one who won’t buy your bull. Sponsors are important,” Martinez said. “Have you been doing the meditation I suggested? Those mental exercises? The reflections and prayers?”
“No, not really,” Sam admitted. “I’m busy. I have trouble meditating—my mind goes a hundred miles an hour.”
“Sam, you can’t be too busy to get and stay sober and to deal with your PTSD,” Martinez explained. “I know it is difficult and time-consuming, but you have got to find the time. Now, let’s talk about next steps. This football game thing concerns me.” They spoke for another thirty minutes or so. As always, Sam felt immeasurably better and departed the session resolved to put into action all of Martinez’s suggestions.
One and Done (Sam Johnstone Book 2) Page 6
