Kate Sherwood - Dark Horse 01 - Dark Horse (44 page)
Read Kate Sherwood - Dark Horse 01 - Dark Horse Online
Authors: Kate Sherwood
With nothing left to busy his hands, he looks over to the table. It’s got one end against the wall, and the visitors have seated themselves on either long side, leaving the end between them for Dan. He wonders if this is a psychological ploy, wonders if it would frustrate them to know that he usually sits there anyway. He wonders if maybe he’s giving these two a little too much credit for deviousness.
He sits down and looks at them expectantly. There’s a pause, and then Bill begins. “All right, well, as Mr. Kaminski has likely advised you, we ran the routine background check that we perform on all new employees, and then we ran an enhanced check due to your position of access to the Kaminski family. It was the enhanced check that raised a few… troubling questions.”
Neil pulls out a digital recorder and holds it up for Dan to see before turning it on. “For our record keeping and to avoid any confusion, we routinely tape all our interviews. Do you have any objection to this?” It sounds like he’s said the same things a lot of times.
“What if I do object?” Dan doesn’t really care, but again, he doesn’t feel like making their lives easy.
“Then we would terminate the interview and advise Mr. Kaminski that you were uncooperative and that we recommend against your employment.” Neil sounds like he’s said that a few times as well.
“Can I get a copy of the tape?” Dan has no idea what he would do with a copy of his own interrogation, but….
Bill answers this one. “We’ll provide you with a copy and a transcript. We’ve also brought a copy of the file we’ve compiled on you, for your records and review.” Bill smiles a little. “We’re not just being nice, California law requires this.” Yeah, Bill’s good cop.
“All right, then.” Bill’s in charge for now. “The concerns that we have arise from a variety of smaller issues and one large one. For clarity, we’d like to just go through them all chronologically. For each issue, we’ll show you documentation or present what we’ve found, give you a chance to review it, and then ask any questions we may have. If at any point you feel that we’ve missed something, please bring it up. And I need to remind you that you’re not under oath, this is not a formal legal proceeding, but it is in your contract that your employment can be terminated immediately, without severance or other consideration, if you are in any way dishonest or evasive in any security-related matter. That’s clear?”
Dan just nods, and Bill pulls the first document out of the folder. “We have two copies of each of these, one for us and one for you.” He passes the sheet over. Dan has to look at it for a second to figure out what it is, but then he realizes that it’s a list of all the school he ever attended. There’s only one school for kindergarten to grade six, then three junior highs, then a long string of high schools. Dan has no idea what this is supposed to prove.
He looks up at Bill, who says, “We’d just like to confirm that these are the schools you attended.” Dan nods, and Bill says, “We only have audio recording, so we need you to respond in words.”
Dan rolls his eyes a little, then says, “Yes, these are the schools that I attended.”
Bill hands over another sheet, a transcript from the last school on the list. “And this is your final transcript? It seems to indicate that you did not graduate. Is that accurate?”
Dan frowns. “I never
said
I graduated.”
Bill nods. “No, we’re not accusing you of anything. We’re just trying to get our facts straight. So, could you confirm that you did not graduate from high school?”
“No, I never graduated from high school.” The coffeemaker has stopped making noise, and Dan stands up and fills two mugs from it,
bringing them over to the table and passing one to Bill. It felt good to stand up and get away from the two of them, and he’s sorry he has to come back.
The next paper that gets passed over is what Dan was expecting. He wonders if the school stuff was just a way to get him off balance, put him on the defensive. He looks down at the arrest report in front of him, complete with his mug shot. Dan in the picture looks young and scared, trying to look old and mean. It’s a little sad.
“This is a copy of an arrest report, showing a Class B Misdemeanor of possessing less than two ounces of marijuana. Would you like to explain anything about the charge?”
“Explain anything? Not really… I mean, I was in possession of less than two ounces of marijuana. I got charged.” Dan pauses for a second, then adds, “I was fifteen.”
Dan shakes his head, then rolls his eyes and says, “No,” out loud. “And were you convicted of this offense?”
Dan is pretty sure that these guys have the court records that show his convictions, and they’re just testing him. He doesn’t really appreciate it, but this is their show. “Yes, I was.”
“And what was the sentence?”
“Probation, and I think community service and a fine.” “You think?” Neil frowns at him.
“Dude, it was a long time ago. I know I did community service for a couple things, paid a couple fines. I can’t remember for sure what was for what.”
Bill says nothing, just pulls out the next sheet. It’s another arrest report, this one for aggravated assault. Dan looks it over, and then Bill says, “You probably remember the questions. Do you want to just answer them all at once?”
A part of Dan doesn’t want to, wants to make this as inconvenient for Bill and Neil as possible, but mostly he just wants to get it over with. “I plea bargained to regular assault. I think I did two months in juvie and some more probation.”
Bill nods. “This one is of concern to us because it seems to show a temper problem and a propensity to violence. If there’s anything more you could tell us about the circumstances, that would be very helpful.”
Dan doesn’t want to go back there, doesn’t want to think about the person he was then. “I
used to
have a pretty hot temper. I was an angry kid. The other guy had been pushing me around and calling me a fag for weeks, and one day I’d had enough, and I fought back.”
“And broke his jaw and a couple of ribs?”
Dan doesn’t really have anything to say to that. “Yeah.”
“Were you injured?”
“Some bruises, and I broke my hand.”
“You broke your hand by hitting him?”
Dan shrugs. “I don’t know… about the same size, maybe a bit bigger. He was on the football team, so it’s not like I was picking on some little geek or something.”
Bill nods. “Okay.” He hands over the next report, and this is the one Dan’s been waiting for. “So, a single arrest seems to have led to several charges here… and we’re a bit concerned about these as well, so if you could run us through the situation again, that’d be great.”
Dan looks at the mug shot on this one. He still looks young, but he’s got a big bruise over one cheekbone, and his expression looks dead. He looks a lot closer to the ‘old and mean’ that he’d been shooting for in his first arrest photo. “I got in a fight with my stepfather, and it got physical. He called the cops, told me to get out. I left, but I took his car. Stupid, obviously. I went to a friend’s house and we got drunk and smashed a couple windows at the school. The cops caught us. We got arrested.” He glances down at the report. “My stepfather insisted that I get charged with the assault and car theft, and then obviously the cops weren’t pleased with the vandalism. And resisting arrest… I’d forgotten that one.”
Dan hadn’t thought about that. “I guess not, no. I went back to the house for about five minutes to get some clothes, but then I left town. I was supposed to do some community service stuff, I think, and report to a social worker or somebody.” He shrugs. “But they sealed my records… theoretically, at least… so they must have forgiven the missed probation, right?”
Bill shrugs. “It seems like. So, this brings us to the end of our findings on your juvenile arrest record. Do you have anything you’d like to add or correct?”
“No, I don’t think so.” If that’s all they want, Dan is relieved. But then he glances over at the file and sees that there’s still quite a bit of paper in it…
Bill hands him several pages stapled together. “This is what we’ve come up with in regards to your whereabouts and activities from the present back to the time when you left the juvenile facility. Could you please look at it and see if there are any errors or omissions?”
Dan takes a few moments to shuffle through the sheets. “Jesus. You guys—how did you put all this together? I wouldn’t have been able to remember all this!”
Bill smiles, and it looks genuine. “We are really pretty good at our jobs. And because of your unique position of access to the family—living on the property, working with Miss Kaminski unsupervised—we were especially thorough.”
“Yeah, I guess!” He flips through the pages, a chronology of addresses, employers, even friends and lovers. He feels like his life has been laid out for everyone to see. It’s a bit intimidating, and he supposes that’s what Bill and Neil were shooting for. He looks up. “Like I said, I can’t remember everything, but, yeah, this looks about right.”
“There are several gaps in there, times when we weren’t able to find an address for you, or any employment. Especially in the earlier years. Would you be able to fill in the blanks on any of those?”
Dan looks down at the sheet. This is like a twisted version of looking at an old photo album. Instead of making him remember good times and loved ones, he’s looking at a record of the worst years of his life. His fingers unconsciously go to the first entry, seeking comfort from his most recent address: the apartment above the barn in Kentucky. They have Justin’s name there, too, and two dates beside it. Dan immediately recognizes the day of the accident and the day of his death. Then Neil shifts in his seat, and Dan drags his eyes back to the older pages, looking for the gaps.
Bill nods. “And during those stretches with no recorded employment—how were you finding enough money to live?” His tone is carefully neutral, but Dan knows what he’s asking.
“I never lived off crime. I… I dunno, I probably shoplifted a few things.” Dan is going to say that he’d never actually taken money for sex but that he’d been happy to take meals and a place to stay from people that he’d slept with, but he decides that’s more information than Bill needs. If he asks specifically, Dan won’t lie. “It doesn’t really cost that much to stay alive if you don’t mind eating at soup kitchens every now and then.”
Bill nods, and pulls out another page and passes it over. “This is a statement we took from Mr. Hugh Winters. In it he claims that you lived with him for a period of about three months, from December of 1997 to early March of the next year. He claims that you were verbally and physically abusive toward him, and that when you left you stole several valuable works of art. We’d like your response to these accusations.”
Dan wants to respond pretty damn strongly, but he forces himself to calm down and read the statement. When he’s done, he takes a moment to collect his thoughts, and then looks up. “Did you notice the dates there? He doesn’t mention it in his ‘statement’, but I think you can figure out why a thirty-year-old closet-case would take in a seventeen-year-old street kid. And that was in LA, so the age of consent was eighteen. So if there was abuse, it wasn’t me doing it. And the reason I left is because I found out he’d been taking pictures of me.” Dan doesn’t want to say what kind of pictures they were, and doesn’t really think he has to. “When I was sleeping and with hidden cameras. So when I left, I erased his hard drive and took the prints. That’s about all I have to say about him.” Dan had started off calm, but he knows his voice was a bit strained by the end, and when he looks down at the paper in his hands, it’s visibly shaking. He carefully sets the page down on the table and puts his hands in his lap, then forces himself to look Bill in the face. Bill just nods and maybe even looks a little sorry.
“Okay. Uh, there’s one more area that we need to cover.” He pulls out the remaining pages from the folder, but doesn’t pass them over as he had with the others. “Before we get started, I’d just like to ask… your father, Richard Wheeler, and your sister, Krista Wheeler—when’s the last time you saw them?”
Dan just shakes his head. “I wouldn’t know how to start trying to find them, and I don’t know why I’d want to, at least for Dick. Krista… I don’t know, I’ve just never looked for her. I thought about it, but… she wasn’t exactly sorry to see me go, when I left. And I guess she hasn’t been looking for me, ’cause you can find me on Google.” He grins a little ruefully at Bill. “But I guess you probably already know that.”
Bill smiles. “Yes, we did check there. It’s a shame you don’t have a Facebook—they’re often very useful for us.”
“You seem to have done all right without it.”
Neil is a bit impatient with the chatter, and shoots Bill a look. Bill goes back to the folder. “Well, we looked them up, and… we have some concerns about what we found.” He hands the report over to Dan now, and he flips it open. The first page takes his breath away. It’s a series of mug shots. The first one is of Dan’s father, looking older and meaner than Dan remembers; the second is of a woman he has to squint at to recognize as his sister, although the name she’s being booked under is Krista Russert; and the third is of a man Dan doesn’t recognize, with the name Scott Russert beneath him. Dan supposes he’s looking at his brother-in-law.