The Closer He Gets

by Janice Kay Johnson

  She stared at him. “What about you? They obviously think I’m the one likeliest to give way to pressure and change my story. Which I find really insulting, by the way. But if you testify in court against a fellow deputy—”

  “Unless there’s a major shift in attitude at the sheriff’s department, which I don’t see as likely, I may as well tender my resignation. I think Portland Police Bureau would hire me again, but I might have trouble getting in anywhere else,” he said, echoing her thoughts.

  “Wonderful. The deck is kind of stacked against us, isn’t it?”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Kind of?”

  Tess made a face at him.

  His smile was surprisingly relaxed. “Yes. There are consequences to telling an unpopular truth. But you knew that, didn’t you?”

  “I admit I didn’t think it out. I was too mad.”

  “You and me both.” Lines deepened between his dark eyebrows. “Tess, nobody would blame you if you chose not to give a statement tomorrow or...softened what you have to say.”

  “I would blame me,” she said sharply.

  After a moment he nodded. “Okay. Then let me suggest again that you try to get a few hours of sleep. You want to be at your best tomorrow.”

  She was surprised to realize that maybe she could sleep now. In fact, she was suddenly groggy enough she could have nodded off right where she was.

  “But what about you?”

  “If it’s okay with you, I’ll stretch out on the couch and catch some shut-eye, too. But don’t worry—I sleep lightly.”

  Tess nodded, stopped the glider and, with a major effort, stood. “I’ll get you a pillow and blanket.”

  “Okay.”

  He followed her down the hall, watching as she put a pillowcase on a spare pillow. Then he took it from her along with a comforter. His eyes were a brighter blue than should have been possible in the low lighting. Dark stubble shadowed his jaw, tempting her to lift her hand to feel the texture. He glanced toward her bedroom before looking back at her.

  The open bedroom door was only a few steps away. Just thinking about bed had her feeling warm enough she wanted to strip off the heavy bathrobe.

  Sure, and why not the midthigh-length T-shirt nightgown beneath it?

  Warmth pooled low in her belly.

  Tess made herself back away. “I hope you get some sleep.” Her voice sounded odd to her ears. A little husky maybe.

  “Thanks.” He cleared his throat. “Sleep tight.” His mouth quirked. “That’s what my mother always said.”

  “Mine, too.” Making an awkward sideways step, she bumped the door frame and blushed. Nothing like being a klutz at a moment like this.

  Moment like what? she asked herself. She was not, repeat, not, inviting him into her bed.

  But, oh, she was thinking about it. In fact her whole body hummed with anticipation for something that wasn’t going to happen.

  “I’ll see you in the morning,” she said more firmly as she backed into her room and closed the door.

  She didn’t bother with wedging the chair beneath the doorknob.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  SENIOR CRIMINAL DEPUTY ATTORNEY Christine Campbell sat one chair removed from the two male detectives who faced Zach across the table. It was as if she was making the point that she was present only as a bystander.

  Her nod as the three introduced themselves was crisp and he sensed annoyance.

  Both Stimson detectives had an air of experience. Detective John Clayton was the oldest, probably in his fifties. Lieutenant Niall MacLachlan might be in his early forties. His dark auburn hair was graying at the temples.

  Seeing Zach’s surprise at his name, he said, “Yes, Chief MacLachlan is my brother.”

  Zach nodded. The poor guy had probably had to say that a few million times.

  It was Lieutenant MacLachlan who asked if he would describe the event in question—cop-speak—from the beginning, as if he hadn’t made a previous statement.

  Zach began with his glance down the side street and his surprise at seeing another sheriff’s department patrol vehicle.

  When he finished, it was a moment before anyone said a word.

  Then DA Campbell tapped her pen on the table. “I would have preferred to be a part of this investigation from the beginning. May I ask why you retreated from your initial statement, which implied that you believed Deputy Hayes was reacting in response to an attempt to take his weapon?”

  He stared at her. “What?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “We were given rather sketchy notes regarding your original statement to Undersheriff Stokes, and an equally abbreviated version of your subsequent conversation with Detective Delancy.”

  “I told both of them exactly what I just told you,” he said flatly. “I have felt strongly from the beginning that the investigation needed to be taken over by an impartial party.”

  “I see.”

  Did she? “My stance has made me rather unpopular. There has been a certain amount of pressure applied. What sounds like an editing of my original statement may have reflected a belief that I would be obedient enough to back off and let the department handle Antonio Alvarez’s death internally.” Cool it, he told himself. “They were wrong.”

  Lieutenant MacLachlan said, “I’m sure you’re aware that your statement differs on many points from that of Deputy Hayes.”

  “I assumed as much,” he said.

  None of the three were easy to read. MacLachlan least of all. Zach had a feeling his apparently relaxed air was very deceptive. Clayton looked as if he didn’t believe Zach. DA Campbell...who knew?

  “We interviewed Ms. Granath this morning,” Detective Clayton commented.

  “I knew you were going to,” he agreed. He didn’t let any tension show on his face or in his body language.

  “She mentioned that there have been a number of threats directed at her. She said she got a call last night specifically ordering her to ‘become confused.’ She was told to forget what she said in her initial statements.”

  “Did she also tell you that, while she was being told ‘they’ could get to her anytime, someone was tapping and scratching on her window a few feet from her bed?”

  “She did. She says she called you.”

  No secret what they were getting at.

  “Ms. Granath was a stranger to me when we both witnessed Deputy Hayes beating Antonio Alvarez to death. I would have had no reason to pursue an acquaintance with her after that.” Thank God he was telling the truth. Later...but that wasn’t their business. “However, I won’t stand by and allow a witness to be terrorized by members of my own department or anyone else.”

  “You believe Deputy Hayes himself is involved in this campaign to intimidate Ms. Granath?”

  “I do.” He made sure his gaze didn’t waver. “I also believe friends of his are involved. It’s hard to imagine them pursuing these tactics without his encouragement or at least compliance.”

  “And what makes you think these friends are fellow sheriff’s deputies?”

  He raised his eyebrows. “The rotting, beheaded rabbit in my locker at the sheriff’s department was one clue. Deputy Hayes is still on administrative leave, as I’m sure you know. It would have been tough for anyone not an employee to get in there to start with. The only people who might have been able to watch me dialing my combination to unlock were fellow deputies.”

  DA Campbell’s lashes fluttered a couple of times, suggesting he’d surprised her. The lieutenant looked exceedingly unsurprised.

  She picked up her pen and made a note, then lifted her gaze to him. “This is very much a ‘he said, she said’ case, which is always difficult.”

  Abruptly pissed, he stared her down. “Fortunately ‘he’ and ‘she’ happen to agree.”


  If he wasn’t mistaken, a smile started to form on her lips before she firmed them.

  Clayton remarked, “A number of Deputy Hayes’s coworkers have come forward with glowing testimonials of his performance on the job.”

  “I’m sure they have.” With an effort, Zach relaxed his shoulders. “Did any of them happen to mention the several citizen complaints accusing him of unnecessary force?”

  MacLachlan spoke up. “I’m sure it goes without saying that we have access to Deputy Hayes’s personnel file, including commendations and grievances.”

  Reassured, Zach nodded toward the paperwork on the table. “I don’t suppose Detective Delancy has made any attempt to discover the name of the woman Hayes was warning Antonio away from.”

  “He isn’t convinced that you could have heard anything said between the two men, given that Deputy Hayes had his back to you.”

  “Deputy Hayes was yelling. And, as it happens, I approached at an angle.”

  The two detectives perked right up. “Did you?” MacLachlan murmured. He flipped a notebook to a blank page and pushed it across the desk to Zach. “Please draw me a map, to the best of your recollection.”

  Zach indicated the houses by drawing crude squares, using smaller boxes for where Hayes’s patrol car had been parked and where he himself had pulled up. A couple of lines, complete with arrows, showed the directions from which he and Tess had come completed the picture. Then he passed the notebook back across the table.

  MacLachlan studied the sketch and then pushed the notebook to Clayton, who in turn passed it to the DA.

  They asked more questions, undoubtedly trying to trip him up. He told her again about Hayes trying to pick up his bloody baton, and how Hayes had ordered Tess to butt out because she was interfering in police business. Zach also reminded them that Hayes had been well out of the area he had been assigned to patrol.

  Zach talked until he was hoarse.

  In the end, he shook hands all around and left, having no sense which side they would come down on. He had the most faith in the lieutenant, even if he was hard to read. Clayton, he thought, might be more inclined to come down on the side of a longtime deputy who had been fighting off an assault.

  It might or might not be a good sign that the DA had chosen to involve herself in these interviews. She was obviously pissed that the prosecutor’s office hadn’t been immediately informed so that they could have seen the crime scene before the body was removed. What was critical was whether she believed Zach’s insistence that his statement had been shaded to suit the department.

  It irked him to know he had to stay hands-off from the investigation.

  He was especially frustrated, knowing how long this could drag on. Ultimately, the prosecutor’s office had to wait until investigators issued a report, and then they’d take their own sweet time in making a decision, especially given the sensitivity of the case. He’d known better than to ask for a possible timeline, but it occurred to him that Tess might have. He’d have to ask her.

  He was walking out to his car when his phone rang. He glanced at the name on the screen, winced and muted the phone. This was the second time he’d chosen not to take a call from his mother.

  Behind the wheel of his truck, he called Bran instead, expecting to be dumped to voice mail. Instead his brother answered.

  “Wondered if you’re free for dinner,” Zach said. “I have some things to discuss.”

  Voices in the background told him Bran wasn’t alone. But he said, “Sure. Where?”

  Zach had found a diner he liked with a broader menu than the tavern’s. Bran’s agreement was abrupt but unhesitating.

  Getting behind the wheel, Zach wondered if this meal would end up cut short the way their first one had, and for the same reason.

  * * *

  TESS’S FATHER SCOWLED at her as she set grocery bags on his kitchen counter. “I have to read about my daughter’s troubles in the damn newspaper?” he said in the voice still a little slurred as an after-effect of the stroke.

  She winced. Wonderful. She should have realized he’d find out about the whole mess one way or another.

  No, she reminded herself. Not the whole mess. The campaign of terror, as she had come to think of it, hadn’t made the paper yet.

  Abandoning the half-unpacked groceries, she turned to face him. “I didn’t want to worry you,” she said.

  He snorted, expressing his opinion without a word.

  “You know what the doctor said,” Tess reminded him.

  “I don’t want to spend what time I have left in some kind of damn cocoon.”

  Her father didn’t swear often. The fact that he’d said damn twice in such a short time told her he was really mad.

  She sighed. “Okay. I don’t blame you.”

  Tell him or not?

  Watching her unwaveringly, he sat at the kitchen table, still a big, vital man. Seeing him immediately after the stroke had been painful. That a tiny clot of blood could steal his ability to form words, to use his right hand, to walk, had seemed unthinkable.

  It hadn’t taken her long to realize he was still the same man she had loved and admired for as long as she could remember. His determination to come back from the stroke had been formidable.

  He’d begun physical therapy with grim determination. He now swam laps every morning. At first an old friend had driven him to the YMCA. He was now driving himself, in a limited way. And it had been nearly three years.

  Maybe, she kept telling herself, the blood thinner really would prevent another stroke. The odds were scary...but he’d beaten them once already.

  Dad was all she had left. It had been years since she’d seen her brother more often than every other year for a holiday. Tess doubted she’d see him even that often once their father was gone.

  Tess had the sudden, disconcerting thought that Zach reminded her a little of Dad. Zach wasn’t a man who would ever accept defeat, either. And he had that same intensely protective nature.

  Making up her mind, Tess sat and said, “There’s more going on than you’ve read in the newspaper, Dad. Promise me you won’t get upset.”

  He snorted his opinion of that, too, which made her laugh.

  So she told him everything, including the fact that she had a defender.

  “Come home,” her father said instantly, the way she’d known he would.

  “I won’t let them drive me out of my house. It might be different if I really thought I was in danger, but hurting me would really backfire for Deputy Hayes. He’s surely smart enough to realize that.”

  “Get a gun,” her father suggested.

  “Dad!” Tess stared at him in shock. He was a big proponent of gun control laws.

  Unbending, he said, “If you won’t protect yourself, come home and I’ll do it.”

  Tess jumped up, came around the table and threw her arms around her father, hugging him hard. “Daddy,” she whispered.

  His arms came around her, too.

  His strong embrace felt almost as good as being held by Zach.

  * * *

  “NOLTE ACTUALLY TALKED to you?” Bran slowly lowered his beer glass to the Formica-topped table.

  “He was a little testy at first, but once I got him started, he didn’t seem to mind talking.” Zach set his laminated menu aside.

  “He never returned my phone calls.”

  “I sneaked under his radar, what with my last name not being Murphy.”

  His brother didn’t look pleased.

  “He promised to try to get a copy of the police report, too.”

  Bran shook his head. “It’ll be interesting to see if he comes through.”

  “It will.” Zach paused, turning to be sure no one had quietly slipped into the booth right behind him. Having his back to the room
disturbed him, but Bran had arrived first and obviously had the same instincts. At least he’d grabbed the booth at the very back of the diner and, so far, no one else had been seated within earshot. “He gave me the names of a couple of Mom’s lovers, too,” Zach added, keeping his voice low whether they were alone or not.

  Bran met his eyes. “I knew who one of them was. I wasn’t sure you’d really want to know.”

  “I want.”

  They were interrupted by the middle-aged waitress who appeared vaguely familiar. The mother of someone Zach had gone to school with? But she didn’t seem to recognize him, so he let it go. Both men ordered and then waited until she was chatting with a family several booths away before resuming their conversation.

  “Who?” he asked.

  “You remember Jack Percy? Friend of Dad’s?”

  Zach had trouble hiding his shock. “You’re kidding. Jack?”

  “Oh, yeah.” Bran leaned back in the booth, anger in the rigid set of his jaw. “Dad deserved better than a best friend and a wife who both betrayed him.”

  Zach shook his head. “Man. I really liked Jack. He never seemed to mind Dad bringing us on fishing trips.”

  “After I saw him with Mom, I quit going on those trips.”

  “I remember,” Zach said slowly. “It hurt Dad’s feelings.”

  “Not like I could tell him why I didn’t want to go.”

  “So you just looked sullen and said, ‘Because I don’t feel like it.’”

  His brother’s face relaxed into a grin. “I was practicing at being a teenager.”

  Zach laughed but was left oddly unsettled. This was the kind of information that made him feel as if the binoculars he was looking through had just been readjusted, sharpening or possibly distorting a view he’d thought he was already seeing clearly.

  “You didn’t know,” Bran said suddenly. “Nolte didn’t give you Jack’s name.”