Now it was Stallings’s turn to hesitate. He said, “No, I can’t do that.”
Sergeant Zuni said, “John.”
He just shrugged and mumbled, “Sorry, I’m not a liar.”
Then the lieutenant said, “Fuck.” She shook her head, then stood to face Stallings. “I’ll have to take my chances with you. There’s too much potential for all of this to blow up in our faces if we don’t get a handle on it now.”
A slight smile broke across Stallings’s face.
The lieutenant said, “Don’t count on me changing my mind too many times. I know what the girl means to you. It broke my heart too when she disappeared. But I’ve already given the photograph to other detectives and I expect you to pass on anything you find out about her to them.”
Stallings just nodded.
Patty Levine sat on a bench in a large common area of the University of North Florida. The campus was one of the nicest in the South and the school had a reputation for looking after its students. On the bench next to her was a junior majoring in business administration and a former girlfriend of Zach Halston’s. Patty had found the girl through other students who had been at the Halloween party two years before. That’s how most police investigations evolved; one interview led to more and more.
The pretty young woman had a wistful smile when she recalled meeting Zach at the party. “He was down because some girl had just dumped him. You know how it is, a guy who needs fixing is hard to resist.”
Patty didn’t quite share those sentiments, but she nodded anyway to keep the girl talking.
“Anyway, he was busy during the party keeping everyone happy and the beer flowing. I mean it got wild. Then we started talking and he seemed really sweet.”
“Did you see anything unusual? Was anyone getting out of hand or girls upset?”
“Not anything more than usual at a Tau Upsilon party. Zach was also pissed off at one of his brothers, but I don’t know why. A couple of them kept telling him to let it go and relax.”
Patty kept scribbling notes and asked about potential female partygoers who felt violated after the party. But the girl didn’t know anything. Then Patty asked, “Did you know which brother he was mad at?”
“No, but Zach said he was going to have to ‘go gangsta’ on him. You know how men act tough, but it never works out. I figured it was all talk.”
Patty said, “Is there any chance you can recall the name of the girl who had just dumped Zach?”
She thought about it for a few seconds, then said, “I think it was Kelly.”
THIRTY-THREE
John Stallings was surprised he felt so nervous, fidgeting by the front door of his former residence, but that was the nature of his relationship with his estranged wife. He hadn’t called to give her notice he was coming over and he knew both of the kids were out. Lauren had gone to the movies with two friends, and Charlie was at a birthday party for one of his soccer teammates. Stallings figured he had at least two hours of quiet with Maria. Something told him now was a good time to sit down and work out the problems in the relationship. He still wasn’t going to tell her about the photograph of Jeanie, even if it would make her look at him in a different light. It just wasn’t right to play with her emotions like that.
He knocked on the door instead of ringing the bell and for some reason felt hopeful. He thought she might view this as a romantic gesture as he looked down at the bouquet of assorted flowers he had bought at Publix for $13.99. For a moment he thought he heard voices; then he clearly heard footsteps on the hard wooden floor of the downstairs.
The knob turned and the door opened inward. He plastered on the best smile he could muster and held up the flowers, but before he could say, “Surprise,” he felt shock ripple through his system. He stood there silently, staring at the man who cheerfully said, “Hello there, come on in.”
Stallings dropped the flowers to the porch but kept his eyes on Brother Frank Ellis.
Patty Levine liked the upscale restaurant where Ken had taken her to sample Spanish delicacies in the form of tapas. The outdoor balcony looking down on a walkway bordering the St. Johns River only added to the romantic atmosphere. But there was something bothering Patty about her new boyfriend. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but looking across at him now didn’t fill her with the same sort of excitement she felt when she looked across at Tony Mazzetti when they had been dating. Ken was handsome and refined and everything else a girl would want in a boyfriend. That only added to her feelings of frustration.
She’d already learned to tune him out when he started to blab about upgrading from his BMW to a Mercedes or the expensive speakers he had added to his home entertainment system. Somewhere in the back of her head she heard her name called three times and snapped back to reality.
Ken said, “I lost you there for a minute.”
“I’m sorry. Guess I’m just a little distracted.”
Ken was about to continue when he looked toward the river and said, “You know that cop down there?”
Patty glanced over the railing to see a young uniformed officer talking to two drunken men. Both were dressed like construction workers and both were larger than the cop. Patty waited until the patrolman turned and she could see him in profile. He had a round face with a wide flat nose, and she had never seen him before.
She looked at Ken and shook her head, saying, “He doesn’t look familiar. We have so many patrolman and detectives that I don’t always recognize them, especially down here in the southern part of the county.”
Ken made an odd face and said, “I just assumed every cop working for the same department would know each other.”
“It’s a big agency.”
Patty glanced back over the railing and saw that the cop was now only speaking to one of the men. The other had walked away. But the body language told Patty that the encounter was escalating from a simple discussion to something more serious. The cop wrapped his hand around the larger man’s upper arm in an attempt to guide him away from the water. The man jerked his arm away from the cop and took a step back. Without hesitation the cop did a classic fake with one hand, then drove his knee into the man’s opposite leg. Patty had used the move a dozen times herself. The man dropped to his knees and the cop had him cuffed with no more scuffle.
Ken scooted back his chair and said, “Did you see that? That cop just kicked that guy for no reason.”
Patty was surprised by her boyfriend’s outrage. Had he not seen the same thing? Patty said, “I thought he handled it very well. The guy jerked his arm away from him when the cop tried to direct him where to go. The poor patrolman can’t wait for this guy to punch him in the face and run away. He was obviously trying to make an arrest.”
“It looked to me like he wanted to kick that guy.”
“What would you have the cop do, Ken? You can’t just let people decide when they’re going to be arrested.”
“You don’t have to act like a Nazi either.”
“Nazi! Now you’re just talking from ignorance.”
“How can you say I’m ignorant? I’m a doctor, for Christ’s sake.”
“No, you’re not. You’re a podiatrist.”
Lynn sat at the bar of the Wildside. For most of the year it was a large but tired sports bar, but during spring break you couldn’t get into the giant bar that had big-screen TVs tacked all across the walls. The owner had gotten smart in the last few years and closed off half of the bar when things got slow. It saved on electricity and the place didn’t look empty all the time. She’d been carefully watching a table where five members of the Tau Upsilon fraternity were sharing two pitchers of beer and watching a Miami Heat and Orlando Magic basketball game. She was having a hard time putting a name to a face and wanted to make sure she made no mistake.