"Never, man." He jammed a key into the lock, pushed open the door and sat down in front of the desk. The noise was somewhat buffered in the small room, and Petty spoke in a normal tone. "Warren forgot his keys last night. I don't know what's up with him. He keeps forgetting things." He opened a desk drawer and started to riffle the files. "It's hilarious, because he really hates to fuck up."
Will stood in the doorway, feeling the breeze of the air-conditioning freeze the sweat on his back, gluing his shirt and vest together. He leaned into the door frame, reaching his hand around to his back, finding his gun snugly tucked into the paddle holster.
Petty mumbled to himself as he searched the files. "Sorry, man, Warren has his own system for filing things."
"Take your time," Will said. He looked at the CDs lining the walls, the way the colored jewel cases were stacked together in their own particular order. It reminded him of his own CD collection at home, the way he identified certain albums not by their words, but by their colors, their recording logos, their artwork.
Will felt a prickling sensation work its way up his spine. "What about the customer files on the shelves? Does Warren have a system for those, too?"
"The CDs?" Petty laughed. "Shit, man, I can't even begin to tell you how he's got those filed. I'm not even allowed to touch them."
"But Warren knows where everything is, right?"
"He can find it with his eyes closed."
Will doubted that. Warren would need to see the colors, the patterns, before he could find the disc he needed. "Were you working here the day Emma was abducted?"
"I was off, man. Total headache."
"Is Warren left-handed?"
Petty held up his hand in response. Will couldn't tell which one it was; discerning between left and right was something his brain could not easily manage.
"Here we go," Petty said, pulling out a file. "Ignore the typos. Warren's such a freaktard. He's, like, incapable of spelling anything but he won't admit it."
"What do you mean?" Will asked, though he already knew the answer. Warren color-coded the CDs, relying on visual cues to help him find the right file. The evidence had been staring Will in the face the first time he'd come into the manager's office to look at the security tape. Warren used the color-coding system for the same reason as Wilclass="underline" he could not read.
Petty said, "Warren's all right most of the time, but the dude won't admit he's wrong about anything. It's like working in the fucking White House around here."
"I meant the typos. You said he can't spell. What do you mean?"
Petty shrugged, handing him a sheet of paper. "Like that, man. I mean, it's like he's in kindergarten, right?"
Will glanced down at the sheet. His stomach roiled. He couldn't see anything but lines.
"Wait till you see this." Petty opened another drawer, and between the hanging files, Will saw several knives like the one Petty had been gripping.
"Where did you get those?"
Petty leaned down, stretching his hand to the back of the drawer. "Uh, the cafeteria down the street. Are you going to report us?"
"Warren steals them, too?"
"We both do, man. The Steakery only gives you those cheap-ass plastic knives." He sat up, holding a book in his lap. "I'll take 'em back, dude. I know it's stealing."
Will motioned toward the book. "Let me have that."
Petty handed it over. "Pathetic, man. He's always acting like he's perfect, right, that he's some kind of mental genius, and then he sneaks in with this? Classic Warren. What a loser."
Will stared at the front cover. He couldn't read the title, but he instantly recognized the multicolored triangles and squares. Evan Bernard had shown him a similar book this morning. It was the same kind that Emma Campano used.
"Open it up," Petty said. " ‘See spot run.' ‘See Jill wet her pants.' I mean, it's, like, a book for retarded one-year-olds. Cracks me up, man."
Will didn't open the book. "Where did he get this?"
Petty shrugged, leaning back in the chair. "I go through his stuff sometimes when I get bored. I found it shoved in the back of the drawer about a week, two weeks ago." He didn't seem ashamed of the habit, but he offered another piece of information to redeem himself. "Warren's got these weekly reports that he's supposed to send to corporate. I go through his computer and make it look less like a moron did it."
"He doesn't use spell-check?"
"Dude, spell-check is not Warren's friend."
There was no computer on his desk. "Where's his computer?"
"He used to keep it here, but lately he's been carrying it with him in his briefcase." He pumped his fist up and down suggestively. "Probably trolling porn on the wireless we pick up from the coffee shop."
"What kind of computer is it?"
"Mac. Pretty sweet."
"Does he have a car?"
"He hoofs it."
"He lives close by?"
"Not far. He takes MARTA." Petty finally got suspicious. "Why are you asking all these questions about Warren, man?"
Will thumbed through the book. The pages fell open to the center where someone had used a plastic laminated card to mark the page. Will looked at the card, saw Adam Humphrey's picture.
There was a buzzing sound. Petty turned around in the chair to squint up at the security cameras. He pressed a button on the desk, saying, "Speak of the devil."
Will watched the monitor as Warren Grier opened the glass door out in the parking deck.
"Stay here," he told Petty. "Lock the door and call 9-1-1. Tell them that an officer needs immediate assistance." Petty sat frozen in his chair, and Will told him, "I'm not fooling around, Lionel. Do it."
Will pulled the door closed behind him. The jackhammer had stopped, but the copiers were still running, the clack of papers humming in his ears. Will was at the counter by the time Warren made his way to the front. The man was wearing his blue Copy Right shirt and carrying a beat-up brown briefcase in his hand.
He was understandably alarmed to see Will standing behind the counter. Warren asked, "Where's Petty?"
"Bathroom," Will told him. Warren was on the other side of the counter, just a few feet away. Will could have reached out and grabbed him by the collar, yanked him over the counter without missing a beat. "I told him I'd catch the phones for him."
Warren glanced down at Petty's lunch, the knife. "Is everything okay?"
"I'm here to show you guys some photos." Will reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the yearbook pages, hoping the fact that his heart was about to beat out of his chest was not as evident as it felt. He fanned out the photos so that Kayla was in front, half of Evan Bernard's face obscured behind her. "Do you mind taking a look at these for me?"
Slowly, Warren put his briefcase on the floor. He stared at the pictures a good while before he took them. "I've seen this girl on the news," he said, his tone of voice a few octaves higher than normal. "She's the one who was stabbed, right?"
"Beaten," Will corrected, leaning down on the counter so he could get closer to Warren. "Someone beat her to death with his fists."
There was a slight tremble to the young man's hand, a nervousness that Will shared. The photo of Bernard was still visible, and Warren moved his fingers to cover it with Kayla's image. "I thought she was stabbed."
"No," Will said. "The boy was stabbed-just once in the chest. His lung collapsed."
"The mother didn't kill him?"
"No," Will lied. "He died from the knife wound. We got the coroner's report this morning." He added, "It's sad, really. I think he just got in the way. I think whoever killed him was just trying to keep him away from Emma."
Warren kept staring at the photo of Kayla Alexander.
"Kayla wasn't raped," Will told him, trying to imagine Warren Grier in a fury, straddling Kayla Alexander, plunging the knife into her chest over and over again. Adam Humphrey would have been next, a single stab wound to the chest. And then Emma…what had he done to Emma?
Will said, "We don't think the killer is that kind of person."