A Perfect Evil (57 page)

“A
m I under arrest?” Ray Howard wanted to know while fidgeting in the hard-backed chair.

Maggie stared at him. His pasty complexion made his eyes bulge out—eyes a dull, watery gray with red veins telegraphing his exhaustion. She rubbed her own exhaustion from the back of her neck. A tight knot pinched the muscles between her shoulders. She tried to remember when she had slept last.

The small conference room hummed with the percolating of fresh coffee, filling the room with its aroma. A stream of orange sunset seeped in through the dusted blinds. She and Nick had been here for hours, asking the same questions and getting the same answers. Even though she’d insisted they bring Howard in for questioning, she still believed he wasn’t the killer. Nothing had changed, but she hoped he might know something, anything, and break under pressure. Nick, however, persisted, convinced Howard was their man.

“No, Ray. You’re not under arrest,” Nick finally answered.

“You can only hold me here for a certain number of hours.”

“And how do you know that, Ray?”

“Hey, I watch
Homicide
and
NYPD Blue.
I know my rights. And I have a friend who’s a cop.”

“Really? You have a friend?”

“Nick,” Maggie cautioned.

Nick rolled his eyes and pushed up the sleeves of his shirt. She noticed his clenched fists, his impatience boiling close to the surface.

“Ray, would you like some of this fresh coffee?” she asked politely. The well-dressed janitor hesitated, then nodded.

“I use cream and two teaspoons of sugar. Real cream. If you have it. And I prefer not using those little sugar cubes.”

“How about something to eat. I know we kept you over lunch, and it’s almost dinnertime. Nick, perhaps you could order all of us something from Wanda’s.”

Nick scowled at her from across the room, but Howard sat up, delighted.

“I love Wanda’s chicken-fried steak.”

“Great. Nick, would you please order Mr. Howard a chicken-fried steak?”

“With mashed potatoes and brown gravy, not the white. And I like creamy Italian dressing for my salad. But on the side.”

“Anything else?” Nick didn’t bother to hide his impatience or his sarcasm. Howard shrunk back into the chair.

“No, nothing else.”

“And what for you, Agent O’Dell?” He shot her a look of contempt clouded with frustration.

“A ham and cheese sandwich. I believe you know how I like it.” She smiled at him, pleased when his dark bristled jaw relaxed and his eyes softened.

“Yes, I do.” It was obvious the memory immediately replaced the sarcasm and frustration. “I’ll be right back.”

She set a steaming mug of coffee in front of Howard, then paced the length of the room, waiting for him to relax. She flipped on the overhead lights. The fluorescents flooded the room, making him blink. He reminded her of a lizard with slow deliberate blinks while he tested the hot coffee with a long pointed tongue. He was listening to the noises of the sheriff’s department. Though the walls muffled the activity, it was easy to hear footsteps scurrying, phones ringing and an occasional voice raised above the hum.

Just when she knew he had forgotten her presence, she stood behind him and said, “You know where Timmy Hamilton is, don’t you, Ray?”

He stopped slurping. His back straightened, ready to defend himself again.

“No, I don’t. And I don’t know how that phone got in my drawer. I’ve never seen it before.”

She came around the table and sat down directly across from him. The blinking lizard eyes tried to avoid hers and finally settled on her chin. There was a glance to her breasts. Quickly he looked back up, but not quick enough to stop the red from crawling up his otherwise white neck.

“Sheriff Morrelli thinks you killed Danny Alverez and Matthew Tanner.”

“I didn’t kill nobody,” he blurted.

“See, I believe you, Ray.”

He looked surprised and checked her eyes to see if it was a trick. “You do?”

“I don’t think you killed those boys.”

“Good, 'cause I didn’t.”

“But I think you know more than you’re telling us. I think you know where Timmy is.”

He didn’t protest, but his eyes darted around the room—the lizard looking for an escape. He held the hot mug with both hands, and Maggie noticed the short, stubby fingers with chewed-off nails, some down to the quick. They certainly didn’t look like the hands of a man obsessed with cleanliness.

“If you tell us, we can help you, Ray. But if we find out you knew and didn’t tell us, well, you could end up going to jail for a long time, even if you didn’t kill those boys.”

His head cocked to one side. He was listening again to the activity on the other side of the door, perhaps listening for Nick’s return or maybe for someone to rescue him.

“Where’s Timmy, Ray?”

He brought a hand in front of his face, inspected the fingers then began biting and peeling what was left of his fingernails.

“Ray?”

“I don’t know where any kid is!” he yelled, holding the anger behind clenched, yellow teeth. “And just because I drive the pickup sometimes to cut wood doesn’t mean nothing.”

Maggie dragged her fingers through her hair. The lack of sleep and food made her light-headed. Had they just wasted an afternoon? Keller could easily have hidden the cellular phone in Howard’s room. Yet, Maggie couldn’t imagine anything happening at the rectory without Howard making it his business to know.

“Where do you go to cut wood, Ray?”

He stared at her, still sucking on his fingertips. He was trying to figure out why she wanted to know.

“I’ve seen the fireplace in the rectory,” she continued. “It looks like it would take a ton of wood over the winter, especially starting this early.”

“Yeah, it does. And Father Francis likes…” He stopped and looked down at the floor. “God rest his soul,” he muttered to his feet, then looked up again. “He liked it really warm in that room.”

“So where do you go?”

“Out by the river. The church still owns a piece of property. Out where the old St. Margaret’s is. It was a beautiful little church. It’s falling apart now. I get lots of dried-out elm and walnut. Some oak. There’s tons of river maples. The walnut burns the best.” He stopped and stared out the window.

Maggie followed his empty gaze. The sun sank behind the snow-covered horizon, blood-red against the white. Cutting wood had reminded him of something, but what?

Yes, Ray Howard knew much more than he was letting on, and neither the threat of jail nor the promise of Wanda’s chicken-fried steak would get him to talk. They were going to have to let him go.

N
ick hung up the phone and sat back in his office chair, rubbing the sting of anger from his eyes. He realized that Maggie must have seen how badly he wanted to hit something, maybe even Ray Howard. How could she remain so cool and calm?

He couldn’t stop thinking about Timmy. He felt as though a time bomb had been planted inside his ribs, the ticking getting faster and faster, drumming against his chest. The ache was unbearable. It didn’t help matters that he couldn’t erase the image of Danny Alverez. That small body lying in the grass. Those vacant eyes staring up at the stars. He had looked so peaceful. That is if you didn’t notice the red-raw slash under his chin and gouges in his small, white chest.

They were running out of time.

Aaron Harper and Eric Paltrow had been murdered less than two weeks apart. Matthew Tanner was taken exactly a week after Danny Alverez. It was only several days since Matthew, and now Timmy. The timetable grew shorter. Something was making the killer explode, sending him over the edge. And if they didn’t catch him, would he simply disappear again for six years? Or worse, would he melt into the woodwork of the community just as he had before? If it wasn’t Howard or Keller, who the hell was it?

Nick grabbed the crumpled paper from his desktop. The obscure schedule he had found in the pickup’s glove compartment had a strange grocery list scrawled on the back. He scanned the items one more time, trying to make sense of them: wool blanket, kerosene, matches, oranges, Snickers bars, SpaghettiOs, rat poison. Perhaps it was a simple camping-trip list, yet something told Nick it was more.

There was a knock on the door, and Hal came in without waiting for an invitation. The big shoulders slumped from exhaustion. His normally well-groomed hair stuck to his head from too many hours stuffed in his hat. His shirt collar was unbuttoned and his coffee-stained tie was twisted loose and at an odd angle.

“What do you have, Hal?”

He sank into the chair opposite Nick on the other side of the desk. “The empty glass vial you found in the pickup contained ether.”

“Ether? Where in the world did it come from?”

“More than likely the hospital. I checked with the director, and he said they have similar vials down in the morgue. They use it as some sort of solvent, but it could be used to knock someone out. All it takes is a couple whiffs.”

“Who would have access to the morgue?”

“Anyone, really. They don’t lock the door.”

“You’re kidding?”

“Think about it, Nick. The morgue’s hardly ever used, and when it is, who’s gonna want to mess around down there?”

“When there’s a criminal investigation, it should be locked, with only authorized personnel allowed in.” Nick grabbed a pen and started tapping out his anger. The desire to hit something still raged inside him.

Hal didn’t respond, and when Nick glanced up at him he wondered if even Hal thought he was losing it. “Were you able to get any prints off the vial?”

“Just yours.”

“What about the matchbook?”

“Well, it’s not a strip joint. Get this—the Pink Lady is a small bar and grill in downtown Omaha, about a block from the police station. Evidently a lot of police officers hang out there. Eddie says they serve the best burgers in town.”

“Eddie?”

“Yeah, Gillick was with the OPD before he moved here. I thought you knew that. 'Course, it’s been a while…six or seven years now.”

“I don’t trust him,” Nick blurted out, then regretted it as soon as he saw Hal’s face.

“Eddie? Why in the world wouldn’t you trust Eddie?”

“I don’t know. Forget I said anything.”

Hal shook his head and pushed himself out of the chair. He started for the door then turned back as if he had forgotten something.

“You know, Nick, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but there’s a lot of people in this department who feel the same way about you.”

“What way is that?” Nick sat up. The tapping stopped.

“You have to admit, the only reason you got this job is because of your dad. What experience do you have in law enforcement? Look, Nick, I’m your friend, and I’m with you every step of the way. But I have to tell you, some of the guys aren’t too sure. They think you’re letting O’Dell run the show.”

There it was—the slap he had been expecting for days. He wiped a hand across his jaw as if to erase the sting.

“I guess I figured as much, especially since my dad seems to be running his own investigation.”

“That’s another thing. Did you know he has Eddie and Lloyd tracking down this Mark Rydell guy?”

“Rydell? Who the hell’s Rydell?”

“I think he was a friend or partner of Jeffreys’.”

“Jesus. Doesn’t anybody get it? Jeffreys didn’t kill all three—” He stopped when he saw Christine standing in the doorway.

“Relax, Nick. I’m not here as a reporter.” She hesitated, then came in. Her hair was a tangled mess, her eyes red, her face tear-stained, her trench coat unevenly buttoned. She looked like hell.

“I need to do something. You have to let me help.”

“Can I get you some coffee, Christine?” Hal asked.

“Yes, thanks. That would be nice.”

Hal glanced back at Nick as if looking to be excused, then left.

“Come, sit down,” Nick said, resisting the urge to go to her and help her walk across the room. It unnerved him to see her this way. She was his big sister. He was the one always screwing up. She was the one who always held it together. Even when Bruce left. Now she reminded him of Laura Alverez—that unsettling quiet.

“Corby gave me a temporary leave of absence with pay from the newspaper. Of course, that was only after he made sure
The Journal
would have the exclusive on whatever happens.”

She struggled out of her coat, tossing it carelessly onto a chair in the corner and only staring at it when it slid to the floor. Then she paced in front of his desk, though she didn’t seem to have the energy to even stand.

“Any luck tracking down Bruce?” She avoided his eyes, but he already knew it was a touchy subject that his sister had no clue as to where her ex-husband was.

“Not yet, but maybe he’ll hear about Timmy on the news and get in touch with us.”

She grimaced. “I need to do something, Nick. I can’t just sit at home and wait. What are you doing with that?” She pointed at the grocery list of items, which he’d turned over so that the strange schedule with its bizarre codes faced up.

“You know what this is?”

“Sure, it’s a bundle label.”

“A what?”

“A bundle label. The carriers get one each day with their newspapers. See, it shows the route number, the carrier’s code number, how many papers there are to deliver, what inserts—if any—and the starts and stops.”

Nick jumped out of his chair and came around to her side of the desk.

“Can you tell whose it is and what day it’s for?”

“It looks like it was for Sunday, October 19. The carrier’s code is ALV0436. From the addresses listed on the starts and stops, it looks like…” The realization swept over her face. She looked up at Nick with wide eyes. “This is Danny Alverez’s route. It’s for the Sunday he disappeared. Where did you find this, Nick?”