by Tom Turner
Crawford shook his head. “Unbelievable.”
“In defense of Christian, he had a lot of guilt about that whole incident.”
“But he did it anyway.”
Vega nodded solemnly. “And there’s another chapter.”
Crawford tried not to look too eager.
“Fast-forward a year. A reporter named Jerry Kopinski, who somehow got word that the whole thing was trumped up, contacted Christian. He told Christian he had some hard evidence about the set-up and wanted to interview him.”
“And?”
Vega looked down and tapped her fingers on the tabletop. “And two days later… Christian was dead.”
Ten
“Ho-ly shit,” Ott said.
He was in Crawford’s office, facing his partner, who had just laid out the entire Holmes Whitmore story that Vega had recounted at lunch.
“Pretty incredible, huh?” Crawford said, shaking his head.
“How to ruin someone’s life and only spend six hundred bucks doing it.”
Crawford put his leg up on his desk. “What do you think of the timing?”
“You mean, Lalley getting offed right before the reporter could question him?”
Crawford nodded.
“I think we should go see our friend Crux again,” Ott said. “Along with this guy Peavy.”
“I agree,” Crawford said. “I also want to check into Vega.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Just… anybody as forthcoming as she was with all that information… I just wonder why.”
“I know what you mean. So, want me to call Crux?” Ott asked. “Set up another meet.”
“Yeah. I’ll call the newspaper reporter,” Crawford said.
While Crawford was having lunch with Vega, Ott had had a guest at the station. Her name was Kelly Wick, and she was the woman jogger who might just have saved Simon Petrie’s life by showing up when she did. She had volunteered to come into the police station when Ott called her. Ott interviewed her in a corner of the reception area.
Ott had his old leather notebook out and was facing her. “So, what was the first thing you saw or heard, Ms. Wick?”
“I heard something that was like a half-scream and half-groan,” Wick said. “Then right after that I heard a dog barking. To be honest with you, my first reaction was to run.”
“Can’t say I blame you,” Ott said, “but you didn’t. So, what happened next?”
“I walked toward the noises, then I saw movement. One man was in back of another man and I saw his arm go forward fast.”
“The man who was behind the other man?”
“Yes, which was when I saw the knife in his hand.”
“And the dog?”
“The dog was barking really loud a few feet away,” she said. “Then it charged the man holding the knife. And he tried to stab the dog. As he did, he let go of the man he stabbed.”
“And the man who had been stabbed… fell to the ground?”
Wick nodded. “And the one with the knife started running.”
“Did you get any kind of a look at him?”
“Not really. Obviously, it was dark, plus he was wearing a hoodie.”
“How tall would you say he was?”
She sighed. “It was really hard to tell. I mean, taller than the man who got stabbed, but he was kind of bent over.”
“Rough guess, how tall?”
“Um, maybe six feet.”
“White or black man?”
“White?”
“And did you get a look at the knife?”
“Just for a split second. There was kind of a glint off of it. I don’t know whether it was from the moon or the streetlamp. But the streetlamp was pretty far away.”
“When you say a glint, what exactly do you mean?”
“I mean, the blade was silver, so it kinda caught the light.”
“Gotcha. And how long would you say the knife was?”
“Really long. The blade especially.”
“So definitely not like a pocketknife or something?”
“Oh God no, it looked like it was close to a foot long. Maybe longer.”
“And when the man ran, which way did he go?”
“I’m not sure. I was more interested in helping the man who got stabbed.”
“That was good of you. But the man, the attacker—”
“I never saw him after that.”
Ott closed his notebook. “Well, thank you very much, Ms. Wick. I appreciate you coming in.”
“No problem. Happy to help.”
Ott stood, then reached into his wallet and pulled out a card. “Here you go,” he said, giving her a card, “in case you remember anything else that might be helpful, please give me a call.”
She took it. “I sure will.”
Eleven
It was three in the afternoon. Crawford and Ott had a busy remainder of the day scheduled. Crux had agreed to meet them at 3:30, and they expected things might get a little heated when he found out what the topic of conversation was.
After meeting with him, they would drop by the hospital to see Simon Petrie. And at six, they were scheduled to meet the reporter, Jerry Kopinski, from the Palm Beach Post, at Mookie’s Tap-a-Keg, their unabashedly downscale cop bar on the shaky side of West Palm Beach.
Five minutes after pulling into the driveway of 1500 North Lake Way, they were facing Crux in his throne-like chair. Crawford half-expected him to be wearing a crown.
Crux greeted them cordially. “So, fellas, are you getting anywhere on Christian’s murder? Any progress, I hope?”
Crawford gave him Standard Answer Number Three, Variation Two. “We’re pursuing a lot of different angles at this point. Talking to as many people as we can. People who might be helpful in solving it.”
“So… that’s a no,” Crux said, bluntly.
Exactly what Chief Norm Rutledge would have said.
“We want to ask you about an incident that recently came to light,” Crawford said.
“Okay,” said Crux with a smile. “What’s that?”
“An incident involving Holmes Whitmore”—Crux’s smile morphed into a wrinkled frown—“that took place a year ago or so.”
“You do know Whitmore, right?” Ott asked.
Crux sighed painfully, like he’d been ambushed. “Yeah, I know him.”
Crawford nodded. “So, we don’t need to rehash everything involving your father and mother—”
“Get on with it,” Crux cut in. “What’s this got to do with anything?”
“We think maybe a lot,” Crawford said. “We heard there’s someone in the media”—he didn’t want to give away Kopinski’s identity by calling him a newspaper reporter—“who believes Whitmore may have been set up.”
“What are you talking about? The guy was a pedophile.”
Crawford nodded. “Yeah, well, so it seemed, but let me ask you a question.”
Crux’s frown got deeper. “What?”
Crawford looked over at Ott. “You want to frame it, Mort?”
“Sure,” Ott said. “Okay, let’s just say you lived in a house. Not this one, but a house where you lived all alone—” Ott paused “—and you saw three photos on the news of three different young boys standing outside your back door. And you knew for a fact—there was absolutely no question about it—that none of those boys ever stepped foot inside your house… would you think it fair that everyone had jumped to the conclusion that you were a pedophile?”
Crux groaned. “Come on, that’s ridiculous, the guy was clearly guilty.”
“Is that right?” Ott said. “What real proof is there?”
“Is it possible that your right-hand man, Leo Peavy, came up with the whole thing?” Crawford asked.
“Yeah, we heard he’s got a rep for being kind of a dirty trickster,” Ott chimed in.
Crawford nodded. “Maybe he planted evidence. Sent photos of the three boys to a few TV stations and newspapers?”
�
�What’s Leo Peavy got to do with this whole bullshit scenario?”
“That’s exactly what we’re going to be talking to the media person about.”
“What the hell’s the point of all this?” Crux said, shaking his head with all the disdain he could muster.
“Point is, Christian Lalley might have been killed because of something he was about to reveal.”
“And point number two is, you might have been behind what happened to Holmes Whitmore,” Ott added.
Crux laughed derisively. “I’m hearing the word might a lot here… Now just imagine if a prosecutor in a court of law were to say, ‘this defendant might have done this, this might have happened.’” He added a head-shake to his derisive laugh. “I mean, come on, you guys really are desperate, aren’t you? You come here and try to connect me and one of my congregants to a guy who committed a bunch of sex crimes. Maybe you ought to be reminded of your mission: to find who killed a beloved member of my congregation, Christian Lalley. Now… I’ve got better things to do with my time.”
He motioned with his hand as if he was shooing away a pair of annoying fleas.
Twelve
“Well, it’s not like we expected him to say, Hell, yeah, I did it, boys, slap the cuffs on me,” Ott said, as they walked down the steps of the house at 1500 North Lake Way. “Fact is, even if he was behind the Whitmore thing, it’s not a crime of any great consequence anyway.”
“I know, but I’ll bet you he’ll still be having a nice long conversation with Leo Peavy before we’re halfway to Good Sam.”
Good Samaritan Hospital in West Palm Beach was only five minutes away. Aside from their late-night visit to see Simon Petrie in the emergency room, the last time they’d been there was when Rose Clarke had been struck by a hit-and-run driver six months before. Rose was, of course, back on her feet now, as good as new, almost like it had never happened.
It turned out that Simon Petrie was in a room on the fourth floor at Good Sam, right next to the one Rose had been in. As with Rose, Crawford had assigned a pair of uniformed cops to remain stationed outside of Petrie’s door around the clock. He wasn’t sure that it was necessary but didn’t want to take any chances.
Petrie was conscious and hooked up to an IV as Crawford and Ott walked into his room.
“Oh, Jesus,” Petrie groaned. “You two. Is this what happens when I talk to you? Someone tries to kill me?”
“We’re very sorry about what happened, Mr. Petrie,” Crawford said. “As I’m sure you know, there are two police officers guarding you and we’ll provide round-the-clock protection until you leave the hospital.”
“And, if you like, we’ll have them watch your house, too,” Ott said.
“So, I guess you’ve come to the conclusion the guy wasn’t a mugger,” Petrie said.
“What do you think?” Crawford asked.
“That whoever it was wanted to take my life, not my wallet.”
Crawford nodded. “Do you have any idea who might have done it?”
Petrie thought for a few moments. “I’m thinking it might not be such a good idea talking to you about it.”
Crawford had run across resistance like this many times before. “I hear what you’re saying, but look at it this way, you help us find the guy who did it and you’re out of harm’s way.”
“I look at it this way,” Petrie countered: “If you don’t catch him and he finds out I’ve been talking to you, he’s even more motivated to kill me.”
“Whoever it is, isn’t getting past those men at the door,” Ott said.
Petrie fell silent for a few moments.
“Is the name Holmes Whitmore familiar to you, Mr. Petrie?” Crawford asked.
Petrie winced at the name.
“I can see he is,” Crawford said. “How about Jerry Kopinski?”
Petrie nodded. “He contacted me.”
“And I’m assuming he asked you what you knew about Whitmore’s connection to Crux?”
“He did.”
“That Crux and Leo Peavy set up Whitmore with those three boys?”
Petrie hesitated, then managed a half-nod.
“So, he was looking for corroboration of the story he got from Christian Lalley. And the reason he contacted you was because Lalley probably told him you knew about the affair between Crux’s mother and Whitmore because you knew Crux way back in college.”
Petrie shrugged. “What do you need me for? You’ve got the whole thing sussed out.”
Crawford smiled. “Not entirely. So, if the reporter publishes that story, it could lead to the downfall of Crux and Peavy and maybe others.”
“So, the question is, is anyone else involved?” asked Ott.
A nurse walked into the room. She ignored Crawford and Ott. “How you doing, Simon?”
“I’m okay,” he said. “Is dinner soon?”
“In about twenty minutes… meatloaf.”
He frowned. “Yummy.”
“Beats that delicious Salisbury steak last night,” she said, and walked out of the room.
“Not great food, huh?” Ott asked.
“Reminds me of British swill,” the Englishman said.
“Who else might have been involved in trying to kill you, Mr. Petrie?” Crawford repeated Ott’s question.
“I don’t know,” Petrie said. “This is just speculation. I reckon maybe the chink… or the new CFO and his boy toy or maybe Fannie Melhado or that jackass Peavy—”
“Wait a minute, slow down,” Ott said, “how many people do you have on your list?”
“Umm, that’s about it.”
“Okay, of those people you just said—four, I think—tell us about them.”
“Actually five. So, the chink—I know that’s not politically correct—is a man named Xi Kiang. Crux recruited him, I think anyway, to build up the membership of SOAR. That’s what he did in China, apparently, though I don’t know all the details.”
“I remember him from the interviews,” Ott said to Crawford. “Not real chatty. A lot of ‘yes/ no’ answers.”
“Coulda just been conveniently blanking out on the English language.”
“That occurred to me,” Ott said with a nod. “So, after the, ah, Chinaman you mentioned the new CFO and his… boy toy?”
“Yeah, they’re married and live down in Boca.”
Ott glanced over at Crawford. “Really? And what are their names?”
They hadn’t interrogated these two, presumably because they lived down in Boca and hadn’t taken part at the Elysium interviews.
Petrie scratched his forehead. “Let’s see, the CFO is named Guy Bemmert and the boy toy is Larry Swain.”
“And then, I believe,” Ott said, “you said Fannie Melhado and Leo Peavy.”
“No, I said, that ‘jackass Peavy.’”
“Right,” Ott said. “So why those five?”
“Xi Kiang because he’s just an all-around mysterious, inscrutable Asian guy and hardly ever speaks. Bemmert and Swain because, I don’t know, there’s just something about them that I don’t trust. Fannie because she’s so damn ambitious, despite her billions. Leo Peavy just because he’s an arrogant jackass and I just get the sense that he’s got a murky past that he doesn’t want anybody to know about.”
“O-kay,” Crawford said. “That’s all pretty general, do you have anything a little more specific?”
Petrie cocked his head and thought for a few moments. “You know, you have to bear in mind I haven’t been around SOAR in a while, so I’ve forgotten things.”
“Understood,” Crawford said. “Do us a favor, and give it a little more thought, will you. And if there’s anything you remember that might be helpful to us, please give us a call right away.”
“Indeed, I will.”
“So, Guy Bemmert took over from Christian Lalley, right?” Ott asked.
"Yes, exactly,” Petrie said, raising his hand. “Oh, wait, I just remembered something that might help you, Larry Swain punched Christian once. Knocked him out, actual
ly."
“Really?” Ott asked. “Why?”
“Because one time after a few drinks, Christian called him a poofter.”
Ott, bewildered, glanced at Crawford for clarification.
“A British slur for someone who’s gay,” Crawford explained.
Petrie nodded and smiled at Ott. “It gets confusing…for us, a fag means a cigarette.”
“When was this?” Crawford asked. “When Swain knocked out Lalley?”
“Right before I left SOAR.”
“Anyone else, Mr. Petrie?” Ott asked.
Petrie raised his arms. “Nobody I can think of. I mean, I guess it could have been a mugger.”
“I don’t think so,” Crawford said.
“Neither do I,” Petrie said.
“What else, Mort?” Crawford asked his partner.
Ott scratched his head. “What about a guy named Pollux? He lives at Fourteen Fifty North Way, what do you know about him?”
“Man’s afraid of his own shadow,” Petrie said. “Used to be a librarian. Need I say more.”
“Thank you,” Crawford said. “If you’re good with it, we’re going to guard you until we solve the case.”
Petrie nodded. “What if you never solve it?”
“We will. You’ve given us some good information to work with.”
“Right…well, good luck,” Petrie said.
“Thanks,” said Crawford. “And good luck with that meatloaf.”
Thirteen
Crawford and Ott had spent more time than they expected at Good Sam with Simon Petrie, which meant they were going to be late for their appointment with reporter Jerry Kopinski.
On their way to Mookie’s Tap-a-Keg, Crawford called Kopinski to tell him they were on their way, but the call went straight to voicemail.
Jerry Kopinski walked into Mookie’s ahead of schedule and found the Palm Beach detectives hadn’t arrived yet.
He sat in a bar stool and Jack Scarsiola came over to him.
“Yes, sir, what can I get ya?” Scarsiola asked.
“Gimme a shot of Jack and a Yuengling. Put it on Charlie Crawford’s tab.”
