Perilous

by E. H. Reinhard

  “Good.”

  “Did he get on his flight?”

  I shook my head. “The officer from up in Atlanta did find what could be blood in the rental car. I’m waiting on him to call back for confirmation.”

  “If he’s running, it’s going to the feds.”

  “I know.”

  “Do you want me to just take Butch tonight?”

  “Yeah, if you want to. I didn’t even think of it, but it makes sense. It will save us a trip in the morning.”

  “Karen will be excited if he’s already there when she gets home. She’s the reason we asked to watch him in the first place.”

  I furrowed my eyebrows. “I thought Karen hated cats.”

  “She does. She hates dogs too. I don’t know—she has been on some kind of maternal kick since your pregnancy news with Callie. I guess she thinks us watching your cat while you’re gone will determine if we can deal with having a baby or not.”

  “That totally makes sense.” The sarcasm in my voice was thick.

  He shrugged. “I know, but I guess it’s a woman thing. Karen and I will have to take care of something other than ourselves for a few days. If we can remember to feed Butch and not lose him, we should be ready for children.” Hank smiled.

  “Please don’t starve or lose my cat.”

  “He’ll be fine. So what kind of steaks do you—”

  My desk phone rang. I held up my hand as a gesture for Hank to wait. I picked up the phone. “Lieutenant Kane.”

  “Lieutenant, it’s Officer Pace out here in Atlanta. It’s definitely blood. Our forensics guys are going through the rest of the car now.”

  “Good. Who is the lead for the forensics unit there?”

  “Allen Manten.”

  I wrote the name down. “Can I speak with him?”

  “One second.”

  I heard talking in the background before a man came on.

  “This is Allen.”

  “Lieutenant Carl Kane from Tampa Homicide. What exactly have you found?”

  “Well, the substance on the driver’s-side carpet is blood, without a doubt. We just got done pulling fingerprints from the trim piece in front of the gauge cluster and also pulled prints from behind it. We got a wrecker coming to take the car to our lab for further testing.”

  “I’m going to have the lead from our forensics unit call you in a little bit. We’ll have to coordinate on this evidence,” I said.

  “Yeah, that’s fine. I should have the prints ready within an hour or two.”

  “Perfect.”

  I got Allen’s contact information and hung up.

  Hank’s eyes were locked on me. “Well?”

  “There’s blood present in the car, and they pulled prints from behind the plastic of the gauge cluster.”

  “Awesome.”

  “Go talk to the cap and see if that’s enough to issue a warrant on Riaola. I need to call Rick.”

  “Will do.”

  Hank walked next door to talk to Bostok. I dialed Rick and gave him the contact information for the forensic unit in Atlanta. He confirmed that he would call them right away and get back to me. I hung up.

  Jenny from the front desk knocked on my open office door. “Lieutenant Kane?”

  “Yeah, Jenny.”

  “You have a guest.”

  “Guest?”

  “He says he had an appointment with you at noon—a Charles Riaola.”

  I snapped my head back in disbelief.

  “Not expecting him?” she asked.

  “No. Um, I’ll be there in just a second. Get an officer to keep an eye on him until I get up there.”

  “Okay.” She turned and walked back toward the front.

  I couldn’t believe it. This guy was guilty, and guilty people didn’t walk into police stations to meet with homicide lieutenants. Normally. My mind immediately went back to Bob Cross trying to outsmart us by coming in. I stood and walked to the captain’s office. Hank was sitting across from him at his desk.

  “Did you just hear that?” I asked.

  They both shrugged. “Hear what?” Bostok asked.

  “Charles Riaola is at the front desk for his twelve o’clock meeting with me. What is the status of that warrant?”

  “He’s at the front desk?” Hank smiled. “Get the hell out of here.”

  “Jenny says he’s up front.”

  “Take him to box one and just start talking. We’re going to need to match that blood, or we’re going to need his prints from behind the dash before we can get a warrant.”

  “Do you want to sit in with me, Hank?”

  Hank patted his hands against the armrest of his chair. “Absolutely.”

  “I’ll be on the other side of the glass,” Bostok said.

  “Cap, can you have Rick or Pax ready to take a cheek swab for DNA?”

  “Yeah, I’ll call down and get one of them.”

  “Okay. I’ll go grab him from the front,” I said.

  I walked from the captain’s office, through the bullpen, to the front counter. Through the door’s safety glass, I could see a man sitting on the bench. Jenny pointed to the guy, jerked her chin at him, and buzzed me through. I walked into the lobby. A quick glance left and right confirmed he’d come alone—no attorney. I was still having a hard time believing he showed.

  “Mr. Riaola?”

  He got up and stretched out his hand for a handshake. He was of average weight and stood around six feet. “Yes. Are you Lieutenant Kane?”

  I gave him a quick handshake and nodded. “I am. Follow me back.”

  Jenny buzzed us through. I walked Riaola to interview room one and had him take a seat.

  I looked down at him. He was dressed business casual, a gray polo shirt tucked into a pair of khakis. A little gray was mixed in with his short brown hair. A trimmed goatee wrapped his mouth and chin.

  “Do you want a coffee or something from the lunch room?” I asked. I have to go grab my file quick.”

  “I’m fine right now,” Riaola said.

  “Sure. I’ll be back in a minute.”

  I closed the door at my back and looked into the observation room. Hank and the captain sat inside.

  “Looks like your average, everyday husband,” Hank said.

  “Did you expect him to be carrying a knife block?” I asked.

  Hank shrugged. “Lunch room trip?”

  I waved for him to come along.

  From my office, I grabbed the case file and all the notes I’d compiled. Hank and I headed to the lunch room for our normal interview offerings even though Riaola had stated he was fine. I wanted to grab a coffee anyway. I was planning on questioning the guy until we got word back on the fingerprints. After I got the coffee, we walked back to the interview room and took our seats.

  “Mr. Riaola, this is Sergeant Hank Rawlings,” I said. “He’ll be sitting in with us today. Just so you are aware now, this interview is going to be recorded.”

  “Why?” Riaola asked.

  “Just in case any little things are mentioned that may seem insignificant now but could eventually help us capture who did this to your wife. It’s standard procedure.”

  He nodded.

  “We grabbed you a few things from the lunch room just in case,” Hank said. He slid a bottle of water and a bag of chips toward him.

  “Shall we begin?” I asked.

  “Yeah, I guess,” he said.

  I took a moment to think before I began—while I wanted to lay into him about lying and grill him about how he’d gotten back in time to make the appointment, I had to take things easy. If I got on him too hard right out of the gates, he would clam—and lawyer—up.

  “First, I want you to know that we will be doing everything in our power to find who did this. Your wife’s murder will not go unpunished,” I said.

  “Did you find the guy she was dating?”

  “Sergeant Rawlings here spoke with him. He checked out.”

  Riaola was silent.

  I
began some easy questioning. I tried to avoid anything that would make him think we were looking at him as our prime suspect. I spent the first part of the interview talking about his wife and their last few weeks together. We went over it for roughly twenty minutes. He played the role of emotional husband to perfection. If I didn’t know about the blood found in his rental car, I might have bought his emotions as legitimate. I paused during the questioning to make some notes.

  “Do you have a suspect?” Riaola asked.

  Hank looked at me to answer.

  “We’re working a few leads now,” I said. I pulled my cell phone from my pocket. I planned to act as though I’d gotten an urgent message on another case, a ruse. I just wanted an excuse to walk out and give him a couple minutes to wonder. My phone did show a text message from Callie that was a few minutes old. “Can you give us a minute, Mr. Riaola? We just got news on something that needs to be addressed real quick.”

  “Yeah, that’s fine.” He took the water Hank had brought him and unscrewed the top.

  “It should be just a couple minutes,” I said.

  Hank and I walked out into the hallway and closed the door.

  “Did you actually get something?” Hank asked.

  I shook my head. “Nothing on the case. I got a message from Callie, though. She’s probably at the store. Hold on.” I clicked the text message to read it. She was asking if we wanted American or German potato salad. “American or German potato salad to go with the steaks?”

  “German,” Hank said.

  I sent Callie a text message letting her know—and that I loved her.

  “All right, let’s go talk to Cap.”

  We walked next door to the observation room.

  Captain Bostok was leaning back in a chair at the desk. The video monitoring equipment sat before him. He pointed through the glass. “He’s wrestling with something.”

  Hank and I walked to the captain’s side and looked through the observing mirror. Riaola fidgeted with his hands. He let out a sigh and ran his hand through his hair. He squeezed the back of his neck.

  “Looks like a man with a guilty conscience,” I said.

  Hank nodded in confirmation.

  “You didn’t hear anything from Rick yet, huh?” I asked.

  The captain shook his head. “Why don’t you guys walk downstairs and see if they heard anything back.”

  Hank raised his eyebrows. “So, Cap, have you heard about this new technology where you can get an answer from someone that’s not in the same room?” Hank pointed to the phone sitting on the desk.

  Bostok flashed Hank a look of annoyance. “So, Sergeant Rawlings, have you heard the one about the sergeant who was being a smart-ass and got assigned to the graveyard shift?”

  Hank shook his head. “No.”

  I smiled. “Come on, Hank. Let’s give this guy a few minutes to stew on whatever he’s thinking about.”

  We left the observation room and headed to the forensics lab on the first floor. I looked around. Pax was working in a glass lab at the back. Rick was in his office. We headed over. I knocked, and we walked in.

  “Kane, Rawlings,” Rick said.

  “Hear anything back from Atlanta?” I asked.

  Rick dug a pack of gum from his pocket and began popping the pieces from the blister pack. “Um, I spoke with their lead, Allen Manten, maybe ten minutes ago. They were on their way to the lab to get started on everything.” He scooped four pieces of the gum from the top of his desk and shoveled them into his mouth. He spoke between chews. “I’d say I should hear something from them within the hour on the prints. Blood will take longer.”

  “Did you eat a clove of garlic for lunch or something?” I asked. “What’s with the gum?”

  “Nicotine gum. I’m trying to kick the cancer sticks. This stuff is awful, though. It tastes like pepper. If I eat a handful at a time though, it kind of works.”

  I nodded. “Whatever works. So that’s where we’re sitting on the evidence? Waiting for now?”

  “Yup, waiting game. Rumor circled down that this guy walked in the station, hey?” Rick continued chewing.

  “We have him upstairs in a box. I’m going to keep him here until we get word from Atlanta. As soon as you hear something, come and let me know.”

  “No sweat.”

  We left Rick to his nicotine fix.

  Chapter 9 - Kane

  Hank and I headed into the observation room. Bostok hadn’t budged since we’d left.

  “Anything new?” I asked.

  “He slammed his water bottle on the table a few times. He’s been rubbing his eyes and cracking his knuckles for the last minute or so. Anything new from Rick?”

  “Waiting for the prints to come down from Atlanta. They should be here within the hour.”

  “Okay. Go try to press him a little bit. He may be ready to pop,” Bostok said.

  “You’re not worried he’ll lawyer up right away?” I asked.

  “Nah, I think he would have come in with one. He strikes me as someone who is going to confess if you press the right buttons.”

  “Works for me,” I said. “I could ask to check him for scratches.”

  “Try that,” Bostok said.

  Hank and I walked back into the box and sat across from Riaola.

  “Sorry about that,” I said. “We had to attend to something on another case.”

  Riaola nodded.

  “We have a couple questions that we are going to need you to answer regarding your last couple days. We seem to have some discrepancies in our time line. It might be on our end, so why don’t you just run through everything from the time you left town until now.”

  Riaola was silent. He lifted his elbows from the chair and folded his arms across his chest. He still didn’t speak.

  I saw a small scratch near his elbow but waited on mentioning it.

  “Mr. Riaola?” I asked. “Your last couple days?”

  He squirmed in his chair. “What are the discrepancies?”

  “Like I said, just a couple things in our time line that need to be ironed out. If it’s easier for you, we can work backward. How did you get back from Atlanta?”

  His body language said he was relieved by the question. He would only be relieved if he was hiding something else.

  “Oh, my sister drove to Atlanta and picked me up. I worked it out with her yesterday when I couldn’t get a flight.”

  “Sure. Your sister’s name?”

  “Agatha.”

  “Agatha?” I asked. “Agatha what?”

  “Agatha Hammermill. It’s spelled just like it sounds,” he said.

  I wrote it down. “And she will confirm this?”

  “Of course.”

  “Great.”

  “Was that all?”

  I tapped my pen on my notepad. “Not quite.”

  He squirmed again.

  “Your employer said you missed a day of the trade show?”

  “Yeah. The night before, we took a couple clients out for dinner. I think I had some bad seafood. I was sick as a dog the whole night and next day.”

  “Sure,” I said. My cell phone buzzed in my pocket. I slid it half out and looked at the screen. I didn’t recognize the number, but it showed an Atlanta area code. I let out a breath. “Excuse me again, Mr. Riaola. I need to take this. You can continue with Sergeant Rawlings.”

  I stepped out and answered the phone.

  “Lieutenant Kane.”

  “Hi, this is Jon Nickerson. I’m the owner of the airport branch of United Car Rental.”

  “Hi, Jon.”

  “Well, after getting bounced back and forth between a dozen or so people, I think I finally got who I need to talk to. I have some mileage information here regarding the car that the police are looking at.”

  I was a bit confused at how he would know what we were looking into. “How did you know that we were interested in the mileage?”

  “My manager called me to tell me that the police were looking into one
of our cars. I got to the office here, and while the police had already left, my manager told me that they were looking at the odometer, and someone called regarding the mileage. I could put two and two together from there. I spoke with the local Atlanta PD at the airport here, and they got me to you.”

  “Great. I’m listening.”

  “We have eleven hundred and thirty-six miles since rental. The odometer was definitely disconnected.”

  “How do you know the mileage for certain?”

  “Well, while we don’t outfit our cars with GPS tracking, I do keep track of their mileage and fuel economy for my records. I have this little logging device that I plug into the car’s diagnostic port. It gives me a readout of the mileage and fuel consumption. I usually do it once a month.”

  “And you are positive that the mileage can be attributed to the last person it was rented to?”

  “Absolutely. I just did my monthly accounting of the mileage last week. No one has rented that car since.”

  “Is this number going to work to call you back in a little bit? I’m going to have to get an official statement from you, but I’m right in the middle of something.”

  “Yeah, this is my mobile number. You can reach me on it anytime.”

  “Great. I’ll call you back within a couple hours.”

  “Sounds good.”

  I hung up and stuck my head through the observation room’s door. Captain Bostok stared through the glass, watching Hank and Riaola. He wore a set of headphones to hear the audio coming from inside. When he saw me, he slid them down, letting them rest around his neck.

  “It’s him, Cap. I just got off the phone with the branch owner from the rental car company. The mileage on the car was a thousand more than what the odometer showed. He made the trip.”

  “I know.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Bostok snapped his fingers and waved me in. I stood at the captain’s side and watched. Riaola had his head in his hands.

  “You just missed the good part, where he cracked and confessed.”

  “Son of a bitch!” I said.

  “Yeah, sorry. Now he’s just going through the apologetic drivel.” The captain flipped on the audio from the room through the desk speaker.

  Riaola sobbed and said he didn’t mean to. He wailed and said it was an accident. The man was actually calling driving a thousand miles round trip and filling his wife with a butcher block full of knives an accident. Hank looked back at us through the mirror.