“Can you give me an idea of when this happened?”
“I’d say he was killed between six and eight hours before the time Mrs. Maynard found him this morning, sometime in the early morning, maybe around one a.m.”
“Anything from the tox screen on him yet? Alcohol levels? Drugs?”
“I’ll get that all to you by tomorrow, noon.” Dr. Hughes looked down at the wreck of a man he’d known only slightly, a good-looking young man of thirty-four, who, until early this morning, had a long life in front of him. “He was healthy as a horse until this. He was fit, took care of himself.”
“No defensive wounds?”
“None. As I said, the first blow to the back of his head took him down, killed him instantly. It had to be a friend, family member, someone he trusted, right? Someone he would have let follow him into the garage?”
Jack nodded. “We’ll find out who he’d been out with. We still don’t know who that golf clubs belongs to. If it was Jason’s, the club might have been right there when the murderer went over the edge and grabbed it. But there was no golf bag. Maybe the murderer grabbed the golf club out of his own bag and used it.”
“That means it would have been where? In his backseat?”
“Someplace handy, that’s for sure,” Jack said. “We’ll see. I’ll bet my Beretta he knew his killer very well indeed. And he didn’t think the person was a threat because he turned his back. I suppose someone could have been waiting for him, hiding in the garage without Jason Maynard seeing him, and come up behind him.” Jack frowned. “But it would have been hard to surprise him like that. No place to hide.” He sighed. “And that would mean premeditation. I can’t buy that. The person found out something, and lost it. This was sudden, uncontrolled.”
Jack picked up the golf club that was leaning beside the door in a plastic bag, already examined by the forensic people. “I don’t golf. What can you tell me about this?”
“It’s a Callaway, a Big Bertha Fusion FT-3 driver.”
“Expensive?”
“Very, but about the same as some of the other big names. They’re excellent.”
“Would there be a whole lot of them out at the country club?”
“Sure. This is an affluent area.”
“Okay, thanks. I’ll be in touch.” Jack left the morgue, actually a converted room in the basement of the Goddard Bay Community Hospital. At that moment, Jack was very glad he wasn’t in Chicago with its chains of command and its protocols. He was free to do what he thought best. He punched up his friend John Goddard on his cell.
John answered, listened. When Jack finished, he said, “I thought I was going to throw up. I didn’t know a human being had that much blood in him-and other stuff. It was everywhere. That was pretty ugly, Jack.”
“Yeah, it was. Okay, I’m heading over to interview Marci Maynard. I’m betting she knows our murderer. You want to come?”
John thought about it. “No, I think it would be best if I stayed out of the investigation for now. This is a big case for us. I don’t want to be accused of crossing any lines, of manufacturing evidence for an indictment.”
“Okay, no problem. Hey, John, you don’t golf much these days, do you?”
“No, not much. Jason was hit over the head with a driver, right?”
“Yeah, a Callaway.”
“Good clubs, used by lots of pros, probably a lot of our locals as well. You might need some luck tracking that down. Oh yeah, Jack, something else. This isn’t about the murder. This is about-well, it’s a favor, a big one. I’m in a little trouble here.” He told Jack about Kelly Beverly, the engagement ring, and the reservations at Le Fleur de Beijing that evening.
Jack laughed, couldn’t help it. “She knocked you right out of your boots, did she?”
“She knocked them into the next town, Jack. I was a goner. You can take this to the bank: I swear on the grave of my crazy uncle Albert that I’m never going to do it again.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s what you used to say when we were hanging our heads over the john the morning after one of those sorority parties.”
“Okay, you’re right. I don’t want it again until I’m more mature, more able to control my brain afterward.”
“Think a moment about a guy’s hard wiring.”
“Okay, maybe you’re right. Will you help me out here?”
“So you want me to come fetch you at the Fleur de Beijing at exactly nine-thirty tonight, with something urgent about the case. That’ll give you an hour-you’re sure you’ll have gotten yourself off the hook by then?”
“If I haven’t, shoot me.”
Jack grinned into his cell. He knew John didn’t really need him to be there, only wanted some help to make a graceful exit after breaking up with Kelly. It had happened before. They’d met at Princeton, John a psychology major because he didn’t know yet what he wanted to do with his life, and Jack in many of the same psych classes because he knew all along he wanted to be a cop. As it turned out John had gone to law school, while Jack went on for his master’s degree in forensic science. The FBI had called, which was gratifying, but he’d wanted something local, and moved back to where his family lived, in Chicago. But now he was here, in Goddard Bay, largely because John Goddard, the newly elected district attorney, had called him at the perfect time. An eighteen-year-old boy, wasted on crack, had shot him in the side after missing him twice. Jack finally returned fire, killing him. Two months later, he was the newly elected chief of police in Goddard Bay. To his surprise, but not to John’s, he really liked the job.
Jack said, “Okay, you got an hour to save your ass before I come and haul it out. I’ll let you know what I find out from Marci Maynard. Wives, I’ve discovered over the years, always know something, if not everything.”
NINE
Jack didn’t drive back to the Maynard house on Westview but directly to Marci’s parents’ house. Milo and Olivia Hildebrand had come to get her not ten minutes after Jack had arrived at the crime scene that morning. Jason Maynard’s parents lived across the country in Hartford, Connecticut, and Jack had hated to make that call. They’d be arriving tomorrow.
Milo Hildebrand, the owner of a local insurance company, savvy and well-off, seemingly sane and balanced, answered the door. “Hi, Jack, come on in. I think Marci’s sleeping; our doctor gave her a sedative. Let me check.”
“No problem, Milo. I need to speak to you and Mrs. Hildebrand in any case. Now is fine.”
Olivia Hildebrand, looking thin and pale, sat on a high-backed chair in the antique-filled living room, her knees pressed together, her hands locked around them, wearing some sort of designer knit thing. She looked up when he came into the living room, then immediately back down again. He didn’t know her well, only by sight, really. He knew Milo because he bought insurance from him.
“Mrs. Hildebrand,” he said and walked to her, stretching out his hand to her. She was forced to let go of her knees. She shook his hand, her own hand limp, and said in a thread of a voice, “Please sit down, Chief. Would you like some coffee?”
Jack would very much have liked some coffee, but looking at those dull eyes and paper-white skin, he shook his head. “No, thank you, Mrs. Hildebrand, I’m fine. I’m very sorry to bother you but I need your help.”
“Hello, Chief Wolf.”
Jack looked up to see Patricia Bigelow walk into the living room.
“Patricia,” he said, nodding. “What are you doing here?”
“She’s our lawyer, Jack,” Milo said. “I called her right after we brought Marci here. She will see to it that we’re all legally protected.”
“Your choice,” Jack said, nodding to her, but he wasn’t happy about this. He could only hope she wouldn’t interfere with his questioning to impress her clients. Pat Bigelow had been in Goddard Bay a bit longer than he. She was a good criminal attorney, and according to John, a thorn in his side more than once. She was known to take no prisoners. She charged the moon, but her clients seemed to think she was worth it. She was able to hide all her toughness and her hard edges well. She was nice looking really, actually appeared more suited to hosting garden parties than defending crooks. She had soft blond hair, cut short, lovely sharp features, and long legs that she showed off, particularly in front of male-heavy juries.