Redemption (A Joe Burgess Mystery, Book 3) (32 page)

"He is," she agreed. "He's just the nicest man. Genuinely nice, I mean, not fake nice." She plucked at the sweatshirt. "This is his. He gave it to me to wear because..." She couldn't finish. "I wear it because it makes me feel safe."

They'd left Joey left lying on the floor, she said, and Tolliver had helped her off the boat and driven her home. "Were you okay? Did you see a doctor?" Burgess asked.

She shook her head. "I couldn't see a doctor without letting my parents know, could I? I guess I really didn't need one, though. Nothing happened."

Right. Nothing but a young girl beaten and terrorized, nearly raped, and left with her clothes, and her faith in herself, her judgment, and men, in tatters. Nothing but Joey confirmed in his belief that he was a victim of the duplicity of women. And what about the parents? A daughter comes home beaten and bruised with her clothes in shreds and they don't call the police?

"What about your parents?" Burgess asked. "Why didn't they call us?"

"Because they don't know," she said. "Dad was out, as usual. Something to do with his business, and Mom was at an appointment." Her shoulders rose in an apologetic shrug. "That was okay with me. I didn't want them to know. He would have started yelling at me and then she would have yelled at me and then they would have started yelling at each other." Another defeated shrug. "They never would have called you. Our family has to handle things ourselves. That's how it's done."

"They didn't notice you were hurting?" There were traces of yellowish purple bruising on her face. Kyle gently reached to push up her sleeve. She flinched, but allowed it. Her arms still bore the marks of Joey's fingers where he'd held her down.

"Maybe if I'd lost a leg," she said. "Or wrecked a car. They think I'm pathetic. "

"We'd like to have you talk to our juvenile officer, Andrea Dwyer, and have her take some pictures and a statement. Would that be okay?" Kyle asked. "Andrea's really nice. She's a runner, like you."

"How did you know I'm a runner?" she asked.

"The way you walk," Kyle said, "like walking is always going to be too slow for you. My daughter's like that. She just started middle school this fall and she's gone out for track." He gave it a moment. "Will you talk to her?"

"Do my parents have to know?"

"That's up to you," Kyle said. It was kind of a lie. If Joey was charged and they had to go to court, her parents would know. Though it might not come to that.

Her muffled, "Okay," came through her curtain of hair. "Have her call me on my cell." Kyle nodded.

"Have you seen or heard from Joey since?" Burgess asked.

She studied the table. "I haven't been to work. I told them I had too much homework. He called twice but I didn't take the calls."

"So you've had no contact with him since the night he assaulted you?"

"I told you," she said, so humble Burgess wanted to shake the woman who'd raised her to be this passive, then go find Mandy a nice new spine, "nothing happened."

Kyle looked over at Burgess, one eyebrow raised. "Joey told you nothing happened, didn't he?"

She nodded.

"And he scared you into saying that."

Another nod.

Kyle's face tightened with anger. "Because he threatened you and Standish?"

A small, breathless "Yes." She gripped the leash so tightly her knuckles were white.

"When did you see him?"

Her face flamed red. "Last night."

Chapter 24

"Thought we were supposed to be solving crimes, not collecting new ones," Kyle said, getting up to pace. "That poor girl. Reciting 'nothing happened' like a little robot. Bastard actually had her believing that everything that happened was her fault. For what? Trusting someone? Wanting a boyfriend? Needing someone to think she was pretty and special? Sounds like she doesn't get that from her family."

He slumped wearily back into his chair. "Just goes to show, as if we didn't already know, that money can't buy happiness." They were back in a conference room at 109, reviewing what they'd learned. Mandy's revelations hadn't been surprising, given what they knew about Joey Libby, but they were more depressing news in an already depressing case. To their list of crimes connected to this investigation, they'd now added assault and attempted sexual assault.

"We'll have to get a statement from Tolliver," Burgess said, picking up the phone, "and I'd like pictures of those bruises before they fade. I'll see if Dwyer's around."

"That miserable little piece of shit," Kyle said. "I almost hope I'm not around when you find him. Can you believe her parents didn't notice?"

"They noticed."

Andrea Dwyer answered. "It's Burgess," he said, "got a teenage assault victim I need your help with."

"Always here for you, Joe," she said. "What's up?"

He filled her in on Amanda Mercer, gave her the address, home phone, and Mandy's cell number. "Like to get pictures of those bruises before they fade, and a solid written statement. She doesn't want her parents to know... so try her cell phone first. Maybe meet her somewhere away from the house?"

"She's bruised?" Dwyer said. "Then the parents know. This girl been in trouble before?"

"Farthest thing from it," Burgess said. "Unless she's got me and Kyle bamboozled, she's a real innocent."

Dwyer laughed. "If she can fool the two of you, there's not a prayer for me. Okay, I'm on it. You want this fast, right? I should try her now?"

"If you could. We don't want to give her time to decide she doesn't want the trouble." Dwyer was the perfect person to talk to Mandy. A strong, athletic woman with a deep well of compassion. They called her the "kiddie cop," but there was no derision in the term. Dwyer was damned good at what she did.

He put down the phone. "Mandy's mother thought we were there about something else," he said. "I wonder what? Seems we're going to have pay a visit to Mercer Metals." He shuffled through his notes. "Out on Warren Avenue, right? Where's Stan's chart?"

"I'll get it." Kyle shoved back his chair.

When the door opened again, it wasn't Kyle, but Perry, looking like he'd survived his visit to Star Goodall unscathed. He tossed a search warrant for Goodall's boat down in front of Burgess and dropped into a chair. "Yo, boss," he said, "that is one hell of a strange woman."

"That she is. She offer you coffee?"

"Too right she did. Said I'd just had some." Perry kicked back a chair and perched on it, edgy as a porcupine about to lift its quills. "I didn't get a heck of a lot. She did some weird things with cards. Said she must have grabbed the wrong jar when I asked about what she'd done to your coffee. Said she couldn't remember writing a check for Joey, but she might have done it as a favor. The boy was always after her for something, said his mother kept him on too short a leash. I gathered, though she didn't exactly say this, that the check was some advance for what Joey would get when the property was sold and Joey had promised to pay her back."

"She get that in writing?"

"Said she did, but when I asked to see the papers, she went all vague on me, started yammering about my aura. She hadn't been such an old skank, I would have thought it was a come on." He snorted. "You ever see a witch flash her tits before?"

Maybe there
were
some advantages to having become old and invisible. At least he'd been spared that. "She know why she was writing that check and to whom?"

"Whom?" Perry echoed. "Aren't we getting fancy." He flipped restlessly through his notes, not really looking at them. "There anything to eat around here?"

"Detectives don't eat, Stanley. They suck essential nutrients out of the air on their way to crime scenes or while interviewing witnesses. We're like those plants... what are they called? The ones that live on air?"

Kyle returned. "Bromiliads," he said, rolling out Stan's chart on the table. "Looky here... right close to that parking lot, we've got Mercer Metals."

"What the heck's Mercer Metals?" Perry said. "And by the way, I found that African guy. The one with the Mustang and the scars."

"Mercer Metals. Place where Joey Libby works," Burgess said. "Or worked. What about this guy in the Mustang? He see anything?"

"Oh, I've had a delightful afternoon talking with people who won't give a straight fucking answer to anything." Perry looked tired. It took energy and focus to deal with liars, and he hadn't slept. He stabbed a finger at Kyle. "Next time, I'm going with Joe and you can go to hell."

"I didn't go with Joe."

"Yes, you did."

"Did not."

"Did too."

They sounded like a couple of third-graders. Burgess looked at Perry's glum face and Kyle's slumped shoulders. "Pizza time, kids," he said.

"Can't," Kyle said. "Gotta get home and see my kids before the court them takes away and gives 'em back to the PMS Queen."

Burgess's phone rang. "Hey, handsome," Chris said. "I'm just taking a chicken out of the oven. I've got mashed potatoes and gravy and—"

"Got enough for two more?"

"That's my plan. Tell Terry that Michelle and the girls are here. And we've got apple pie. Homemade."

"We're on our way."

"Change of plan," he told the others, "Chris has roast chicken and apple pie. And Ter, Michelle and the girls are there. That be okay?"

"You don't deserve her, Joe," Perry said.

"Shut up, Stan," Kyle said. "Choices you make, you've got no standing to criticize anyone."

"You can shut the fuck up about that, Terry. It's not like you've never made a mistake. Which one of us married the fuckin' PMS Queen?"

"Yeah? Who fucks other people's wives and gets his head beat in?"

This was what happened when a case started grinding them down. What they really needed was a break in the case and some sleep, but a good meal would help. "The Mustang guy," Burgess interrupted, "he say anything useful?"

"Maybe if I spoke fuckin' Somali. Look, I've heard that asshole speak perfectly good English. I start asking questions and he acts like he's never heard a word of English in his life. I don't get it, you know, these people come over here because they want the good life, they want to live like Americans. So why the fuck won't they talk like Americans?"

"You're sure it was Somali?"

"Well, he fuckin' said it was."

"We can get a translator. Think you can find him again?"

"Did it once, didn't I? We any closer to finding that little bastard Joey?"

"Got more reasons we want him found," Kyle said. As they walked to their cars, he filled Perry in on Amanda Mercer.

Burgess shook his head. He was starting to feel as cranky as Perry. Getting together and talking was invaluable, but what he wanted was time alone, driving around in the car or at his desk, trying to put the pieces together. What he
needed
to do was go to Mercer Metals. Find a translator. Talk to Nick Goodall. See if the lab had any toxicology results back. Find Joey. Find somebody who knew where Reggie had been working. He needed some kind of divine intervention to give him a clue and knew full well that the best kind of intervention had more to do with dogged persistence than divinity. Heaven helped those who helped themselves?

Captain Cote was in the hall by the elevator. "Burgess," he said, his plump white finger crooking in a slightly obscene "come hither" gesture, "got a minute?"

"I'm ten-seven, but I've always got a minute for you, Paul." He turned to the others. "You guys go ahead. I'll meet you there." He followed Cote downstairs.

Cote pursed his duck's-ass mouth and before the first word emerged, Burgess knew what was coming. Amanda Mercer's mother. "Got a complaint from a citizen, Joe." Cote let it go a beat for dramatic effect, then, "A Mrs. Lois Mercer. She's very upset at the way you and Kyle pressured her into letting you interview her daughter. She doesn't think it was right for you to interview a fifteen-year-old without having her present."

"Started as a routine thing," Burgess said. "We were looking for a bad guy, thought the girl might know where we could find him. Girl's seventeen," he added, "not fifteen. Turns out guy we're looking for tried to rape her. She didn't want to talk about a physical and sexual assault by a convicted felon in front of her mother. We figured it was better to get the bad guy off the street than make a controlling mother happy." He sat up straighter so he loomed over the smaller man, and tented his own hands. "What's the problem?"