Punish the Deed (20 page)

Thirty-Six

Jake placed Steve Broderick into one interrogation room and Lucinda took Angela to another. While the couple sat on uncomfortable chairs, in separate rooms, looking at bare walls, Lucinda and Jake went down to the café to grab a cup of coffee and a bite to eat. They took their time eating breakfast biscuits and sipping on two cups of coffee each. Then they sauntered back upstairs to deal with Steve and Angela. By mutual agreement, Lucinda took Angela and Jake went into the room with Steve.

Jake started by asking about the couple’s road trip. Steve went through more detail about meeting each other’s family members than Jake ever wanted to hear but he let Steve ramble hoping at some point he would say something that actually mattered.

In the middle of an explanation about the interaction between Angela and Cousin Bertie, Steve took a sharp intake of air and said, “I’ve got it. I’ve got proof.” He twisted his arm around to his back pants pocket. Then he jerked forward, held up both his hands and, “Sorry. Sorry. No false moves, right? I’m not used to this stuff. Do you want to remove my wallet from my rear pocket?”

Jake shook his head. He had a juvenile urge to pull his gun out of his holster and see if the guy started begging for his life. Instead, he suppressed that baser impulse, squeezed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and index finger and said, “No, no, Mr. Broderick. You go right ahead and remove your wallet and show me what you’ve got.”

Steve moved with slow deliberation providing play-by-play commentary. “I’m turning at the waist. I’m reaching my arm to my back pocket. I’ve got my fingers on my wallet. I’m sliding it out. I’m bringing it to the front of my body and setting it on the table. There!” He beamed at Jake.

In the most patient voice he could muster, Jake said, “What’s in the wallet, Mr. Broderick?”

“Oh, yes, right.” Steve carefully folded down one side of the tri-fold and then the other. “I’m going to remove the contents now,” he said.

“Fine, Mr. Broderick.”

Steve spread apart the section that holds paper money, pulled out a modest wad of folded bills and set them on the table. Then he reached into the corner and jerked out a small bundle of white receipts folded together with symmetrical, crisp corners.

“Did you iron those?” Jake asked.

“Oh, of course not. I was on the road, Agent Lovett. But when I got each one, I laid it on a flat surface and smoothed it flat before putting it with the others.”

Observing the seriousness of the response, Jake nearly choked as he struggled to suppress laughter. He hunched over with a hand over his mouth until he regained control. Steve pushed the neat pile of receipts across the table. Jake glanced at each one for the location and date, more out of respect for the offering than because he felt a need to verify Steve’s statement. “Mr. Broderick, I accept your story of your journey to Florida and Louisiana. I believe you are telling me the truth. Although it appears pretty impossible for you to have made a side trip to Washington, D.C. during this time frame, it still doesn’t account for your whereabouts on the night that Shari Fleming was killed. And before you say it, I am sure lots of folks saw you at church that Wednesday night but what about after church? Was Miss Dromgoole with you as she said?”

Steve threw a hand over his mouth, closed his eyes and furrowed his brow. He took a deep breath, dropped his hand and looked at Jake. “It pains me to have to say this, Agent Lovett, but Angela told a fib. She was trying to protect me but I know she should not have done that. It was wrong. And I am sorry. I was at home alone. No one but my dog saw me that night after the services. Angela is a good, God-fearing woman. I have not had . . . uh . . . uh . . . carnal knowledge of her,” he said, his face burning bright red.

Jake looked down at the table and took a couple of breaths to prevent himself from losing it. Then he asked, “Did you stop by the school district building before you went home?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Did you stop anywhere?”

“No, sir. I went straight home.”

“Did you go out that evening at all?”

“No. Scout’s honor,” he said, raising his fingers in the pledge sign.

“Okay,” Jake said as he pushed away from the table, “you wait right here for a while. I’ll be back.”

“Please don’t arrest Angela.”

“Relax, Mr. Broderick, I doubt we’ll find a reason to do that.”

In the other interrogation room, Lucinda was not at all amused. Angela kept insisting she was with Steve all night long. After trying to coax the truth out of Angela, Lucinda was exasperated. “Ms. Dromgoole, please stop lying about Mr. Broderick. You are not helping the situation.”

“I am not lying. We spent all night long in hot, steamy sex. Do you want the details?”

“Oh, please, no. I do not want to hear about your sexual fantasies. I just want you to admit to where you were that night.”

“I told you. I spent the night in Steve’s bed with his arms around me. If he’d left even for a moment, I would have known. I would have felt the absence of his warm, passionate body the second he pulled away – before he even set his feet on the floor.”

Lucinda threw back her head and contemplated the ceiling. When she looked back at Angela, she said, “Don’t you want to go home? If you tell me the truth, I’ll let you go home.”

“Oh, right. I know that cop trick. I’ve seen it on TV. You can’t fool me. And you can’t prove I wasn’t with Steve.”

“I probably can, Ms. Dromgoole. So why don’t you save us both some time?”

“What did you run your face into anyway? It’s a mess.”

“This is not about me, Ms. Dromgoole.”

“Oh yes it is. You’re jealous. You’re jealous that I look good enough to catch a man and you don’t. You’re jealous that I can spend the night with a man and no one wants you. I know your type.”

Lucinda clenched her teeth, rose from her seat and walked to the door.

“Where are you going? You can’t leave me in here,” Angela protested.

Lucinda left without comment. She went into the observation room just in time to see Jake stand and exchange a few last words with Steve. She met him in the hall.

“I sure can see why you and Trivolli eliminated him as a suspect,” Jake said. “He’s a boring, anal weenie. You should see how he folds his receipts.”

“The aged sex fiend in the other room is sticking with her story,” Lucinda said.

“Broderick is not sticking with it. He apologized for her behavior. And get this: he swears he has not had “carnal knowledge” of her.”

“Carnal knowledge?”

“His words, not mine. I swear,” Jake said with a laugh. “I think we ought to find somebody to give them a ride back to Broderick’s place.”

“It really irks me to let her go home while she’s still lying to me.”

“Okay, let’s both go in and see if it’ll help if I confront her with Broderick’s words.”

When they entered, Jake slid into the seat across from Angela and Lucinda slouched against the wall.

“That woman,” Angela said, pointing at Lucinda, “called me a liar.”

Jake turned to Lucinda, who shook her head. Then he looked at Angela and said, “Really?”

“Yes, sir, Agent Lovett.”

“She actually used those words?”

“Yes, sir,” she said with a nod.

“I’ll have to review the tape.”

Angela blanched, followed by the appearance of a bright red circle on each cheek. “Tape?”

“Yeah, you knew it was all being recorded, didn’t you?”

“Yes. I forgot. Maybe she didn’t use those exact words but she implied them. She accused me of lying.”

“Did you tell her you were with Steve Broderick the night of Shari Fleming’s death?”

“I certainly did,” Angela said, straightening her posture and jutting out her chin, “because I was.”

“I don’t think so.”

“What you think, young man, does not affect the truth.”

“Ma’am,” Jake said, leaning forward across the table, “what you say doesn’t change the truth, either.”

“Are you calling me a liar, too?” Angela said as she pressed back in her chair.

“Yes, ma’am. And so is Steve Broderick. On his recorded statement, he apologized for your lie.”

“He’s just trying to protect me and my reputation.”

“No, Ms. Dromgoole.” Jake turned to Lucinda and said, “Lieutenant, could you please give us some privacy.”

Lucinda squinted her eye, plastered both of the people at the table with a sneer and left the room.

Jake gave her enough time to get into her observation post on the other side of the glass before scooting his chair to the end of the table. He took one of Angela’s hands between both of his. “Angela, listen,” he said and paused, waiting for her full attention. When her eyes were firmly fixed on his, he smiled. She smiled in response. “I am about to let Mr. Broderick go home. I sure would like to let you go with him. But Lieutenant Pierce is a real tough ass – pardon my language, but I just don’t know how else to describe her. I need you to tell me the truth. Then I can force her to let you go home.”

Angela looked down at the table then back up at Jake. “You can do that?”

“Yes.”

“You’re not going to arrest Steve?”

“No.”

“Honest?”

“Cross my heart,” Jake said as he removed one of his hands from hers and sketched an X on his chest.

She breathed in deeply, exhaled and said, “I didn’t even go to church that night. I had a headache.”

“So you didn’t see Steve Broderick that night, did you?”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m sorry. That woman just frightened me. She’s so intimidating. If she hadn’t been so mean, I never would have lied.”

“Okay, Angela. You sit right here. I’ll work things out.”

As he stood and pulled away his hand, she grabbed on to it tightly. She looked him in the eyes and in a breathy voice said, “Thank you, Agent Lovett. I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you.”

He slid his hand out of her grip and said, “No problem, ma’am. Just doing my job.”

Lucinda and Jake met out in the hall and looked at each other with clenched lips. They scurried away until they knew their distance was far enough that they would not be overheard. Then, they doubled over in laughter. “Oh, jeez, Jake. ‘Just doing my job?’ You were unbelievable. How did you keep a straight face?”

“It was not easy, not easy at all.”

“She might be holding out on Broderick but, I swear, if you asked, she would have given it up for you right there on the table.”

“Oh, please, that’s a vision I don’t need floating around in my head,” Jake begged.

“I’ll go find a patrol officer to take them home,” Lucinda said.

They looked at each other and smiles faded from both of their faces. “You know what I’m thinking, Lucinda?”

“Yeah, we just lost our only suspect.”

Thirty-Seven

He picked his next victim after seeing his photograph in the newspaper. He stood beaming, one arm raised high in the air, fingers arranged in a “V” for victory. It was that symbolic gesture that aggravated him more than anything. He read about Frederick Lee’s plan to end child abuse in his lifetime through “Enough”, a new program initiated by his organization, the Family Service Center. The story quoted Lee at length as it discussed the new total immersion approach that included intensive workshops, child-parent confrontation and guerrilla counseling. The whole project made him angry. Whether or not it was effective was irrelevant to his reaction. His irrational rage centered around one reality:
no one ever did this for me
.

He’d watched the offices of the Family Service Center for days and realized that the most effective way to get to his victim was from the inside. But to do that, he needed to clean up a bit, capture that presentable but humble look.

He scoped out a blue-collar neighborhood, seeking a home without a dog where the residents all left the house about the same time for work and school. From the handful of places that fit that requirement, he selected the one where the man’s size most closely matched his own.

He returned early in the morning. He watched the Dad drive away in his car. He saw the kids walk off to school. Then he saw the Mom emerge and take her place at the bus stop on the corner. When she boarded and the transit system whisked her away, he slipped into the yard and found the most concealed window. Using the blade on his pocket knife, he forced the screen out of its track, twisted and pulled on the frame and set it behind a bush next to the house. He was pleased to notice the window latch was not engaged. His first attempts to push open the window, though, did not work. He ran the blade of his knife around the edges of the window frame, flaking away the paint that held if shut. He grunted as he shoved on it again. It gave just enough to create a slot for his fingers. He reached in and pushed up but the progress was slow; he struggled for every centimeter of elevation.

At last, the opening was wide enough that he could slide into the house. He looked around for any observers in the vicinity and, seeing none, threw one leg over the sill and edged his body into the room.

He stood in a bedroom – a little girl’s bedroom from all appearances, ruffled pink bedspread, a mountain of stuffed animals and white painted furniture. He walked out into the hallway, looking for the master bedroom. When he found it, he slid open the closet door and selected a pair of pants, a shirt and a belt, taking care that each item he chose showed some signs of wear without appearing worn out.

In the chest of drawers, he picked out a T-shirt, a pair of boxer shorts and a rolled-up pair of socks. He transferred all of the clothing to the bed in the little girl’s room. Just in case he had to make a quick exit, he wanted to be able to grab all of it on his way out the window.

In the bathroom, he turned on the shower to heat up the water while he undressed. The air was steamy by the time he pulled back the curtain and stepped inside. For a while he just stood there, head tossed back, water beating on his chest and sluicing down his legs. At first the rivulets ran dark, nearly black. It had been quite some time since he’d bathed. When the water finally ran clear again, he turned around and let it beat on his back and buttocks. It felt good to feel the water massaging his skin and the layer of grime dissolve in the stream and roll down the drain.

He grabbed a bar of soap and rubbed it between his hands, stirring up rich, foamy lather that he swabbed on his face and his neck, then in his armpits and every other nook and cranny of his body. Next, he poured a healthy dollop of shampoo into his palm and worked it into his hair. His dirt-encrusted strands felt liberated as the oils and caked-up residue washed away.

He smiled at the bottle of conditioner. It seemed kind of girly but why not? He put a handful of that on his scalp and worked it in. He hummed while he waited for two minutes to pass and then rinsed it out. Then he just stood there, shifting front and back under the shower, loving the sensation of the pellets of water pounding on his skin. He let it run until it began to cool.

He grabbed one towel off the bar and ran it all over his body, soaking up moisture. He tossed it on the floor of the shower. Then he grabbed another and used it to rub his head with vigor, pulling out as much moisture as he could, and tossed it aside. He grabbed a third towel and caressed his body as he savored the touch of clean cotton on his skin.

He picked up the electric razor off the counter and moved it across his beard and mustache areas until they were smooth. Then he ran it over the hair that sprouted on his neck at his collar line. When he was finished, he ran his hands over the freshly shaved places and grinned at his image in the mirror.

He walked naked down the hall, enjoying the feel of the carpet in his toes. He slid into the borrowed boxer shorts and sighed with pleasure. There are no words to describe how nice a clean pair of underwear felt after weeks without. When he finished dressing in the other man’s clothing, he snatched a gym bag from the bedroom closet and stuffed his dirty pants, shirts and socks inside. He added a pad of paper and a couple of pens he found on a desk in the corner of the dining room. His used underwear were gross – too smelly and filthy to keep. He found a bag in the kitchen and stuffed them in there. He walked out the back door, gym bag in one hand, trash sack in the other. He dumped the latter into the first dumpster he encountered on his walk back to the Family Services Center.

He spent the rest of the morning spying on the center, estimating the number of people who worked there. For a while, he leaned against the back wall of the building writing a new note. When he finished it, he signed his full name with a huge flourish. The big, bold signature reminded him of the teacher who had taught him about John Hancock in American History class. The anger inside him rose up in a hot rage.
She left me behind, too. They all did. Maybe I should do a teacher sometime – they were goodie two shoes, too.

He straightened up and struggled to wipe the emotion off his face. He didn’t want to raise suspicion or give anyone cause for concern. It was time for the staff to leave for lunch. He watched the front door and drew a gender-specific stick figure for everyone who came outside. After twenty minutes, if he’d calculated correctly on previous days, there was now only one person inside: the receptionist. He tucked his gym bag behind a dumpster for safe keeping and walked into the office. He nodded in the receptionist’s direction before taking a seat.

“May I help you, sir? Do you have an appointment?” the receptionist asked.

He stood and walked to her desk. “I’m supposed to see a counselor.”

“They’re all out to lunch now. Are you sure you’ve got the right time? Who are you supposed to see?”

“I don’t know the counselor’s name, ma’am. I’m supposed to meet my social worker here from the child welfare agency. She knows who we’re supposed to see. I don’t rightly know the time either. The social worker wrote it down for me but I lost it. All I remember was that it was this afternoon.”

“Well, maybe if you tell me why you’re here, I can narrow it down.”

“Ma’am, I”m here on accounta my wife. She drinks and when she drinks, she beats on the kids something fierce. The social worker said you all had a program for people in denial about their problems and you might could help my family.”

“That sounds like the program with the guerilla-counseling component. You probably need to see Mr. Lee. But I don’t see any appointments on his calendar with any social worker this afternoon. Are you sure you have the right day?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m sure of that. Is there someone else here you can ask?”

“No, everybody else has gone out to lunch,” she said and then swallowed hard with the knowledge that she’d just made herself vulnerable. She fiddled with items on her desk.

He picked up on her discomfort instantly. He entertained a momentary fantasy of taking advantage of her fear but reminded himself of his goal.
Tonight Frederick Lee will die. I don’t have time for a side show.
He smiled softly at her and said, “I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable. I shouldn’t have asked the question of a young woman like yourself. It was bound to make you nervous. I’ll just wait outside.”

She blushed and responded, “Oh no, sir. I am so sorry. Please have a seat.”

“That’s mighty sweet of you, ma’am. But I grew up with a couple of sisters and I know just what you’re feeling. I’ll wait outside so you can relax.”

“It’s really not necessary but thank you for your understanding, Mr. . . .?”

“Gilbright,” he lied with automatic ease. “Lucius Gilbright. Thank you for your trouble, ma’am,” he said as he turned and walked out the door.

He positioned himself with a clear view of the door and drew a diagonal line through the stick figure representing each person as they returned from lunch. Later, he’d add a line in the other direction making an “X” over the staff as they left for the day – until only one remained, the person who was the last to leave every day: Frederick Lee.

The afternoon was sunny and comfortably warm. He brushed the dirt away from a patch of concrete at the base of the wall. He sat down with his back leaning against the brick and his legs stretched in front of him enjoying the warmth of the afternoon sun on his face. It made him feel drowsy and without knowing it, he dosed off and the pad of paper slipped from his hands.

He awoke with a rush of adrenaline. Sirens. Lots of sirens. Pulling up in front of the building. Pulling into the parking lot behind the building. People running inside the office. He didn’t know what was happening. But he knew he had to get out of here. He cursed as he ducked behind parked cars.
Everything was ready. Everything in order. Tonight was the night. Damn. Damn. Damn.
He kept hidden behind cars and dumpsters as he made his way down behind the strip of office buildings. When he reached the end, he jumped up, darted to the side of the building and stood still. He calmed his breathing, listened for any sounds of pursuit, then sauntered away up the street. He was many blocks away before he remembered what he’d left behind – the gym bag of dirty clothes and the notepad with the signed letter.