“I’m sorry, Jake.” Jane quieted her voice and touched the sleeve of his T-shirt, surrendering. “Do whatever you need to do. It’s fine. We can always go, right?”
And here she’d predicted this evening’s only conflict would be about whether Jake knew she knew that Elliot Sandoval had-hey. She rewound to the sentence she’d cut off earlier. “Jake? Seriously. Don’t you need to be in town? Working the Waverly Road murder?”
“Supe’s assigning that to someone else,” Jake said. “I’m out of town, D and Kat are on vacation.”
“They get to go?” Jane heard the annoyance in her voice. C’mon, Jane. “I know it’s not your fault, Jake. Really. I’m just disappointed.”
And truth be told, Jake being off the case did make her reporting on that story less complicated. Still, she’d rather be complicated and in Bermuda with him.
“I thought you’d kill me,” he said.
“Don’t tempt me.” She reached for her glass of wine, thought about draining it, took a sip instead. “But then I’d have to get rid of your body somehow. And I like it too much to dump it somewhere.”
“I like yours, too,” he said. “As you well know. And I’ll make it up to you. Somehow.”
“Okay, deal. In fact…” She faced him, hands on hips. Half teasing. “… how about starting right now. You said ‘false confessions.’ Who confessed? To what? Why do you think it’s false?”
Jake was shaking his head. “Uh-uh, sister. I can’t tell you that.” He sat back on the couch. Patted the spot next to him. “Truce?” he said. “Rain check?”
Jane sank down beside him, slowly. She pressed her arm against his, leaned her leg against his Levi’s. He was leaving town, first thing in the morning, and this it would be their last time together for however long. “I had a great new bathing suit,” she said. “It’s very, very, very small. Too bad you won’t get to see it.”
He kissed her, his lips brushing her hair. “Someday,” he whispered.
They sat, silent, watching out the bay window as the streetlights came on along Corey Road, hearing only tinkling music, Scott Joplin, as an ice cream truck trundled its way down her street. Jane thought about juggling and balance and how plans sometimes worked. Sometimes didn’t. About whether the whole thing was doomed to failure, because of his job, and hers, and the impossibility of it all. About what had happened to ruin their weekend, and take Jake out of town without her. About how she would have made the same decision, to follow a story and leave Jake at home. About whether this was the universe notifying them they should face reality and call it off.
“Someday,” she said.
The music outside faded, then disappeared.
18
“You’ll need to tell me the truth, that’s all there is to it.” Peter Hardesty tried to decide whether he was visiting the cramped and faintly mildewy studio apartment of a murderer or a liar.
The liar part he could handle, but first he’d have to get Gordon Thorley to reveal why he was fabricating a confession. What would cause someone to playact like that? Maybe his client was a headline seeker, needed the spotlight, craved the attention. Peter had seen a few of those types in his legal career. Maybe Thorley was a nut. Peter had seen even more of those.
The murderer part he could also handle, if it eventually turned out law enforcement could provide sufficient evidence Gordon Thorley was at the Arboretum on that Lilac Sunday nineteen years ago. Even if Thorley’s sister’s financing ran out, he could probably get appointed to the case and make sure the guy received a zealous defense.
Innocent, guilty, or crazy. Peter simply had to discover which legal path to pursue.
But right now, Gordon Thorley seemed most interested in the large-no-sugar that Peter had provided. A slug of caffeine was occasionally enough to get guys like this to talk. Not Thorley. Not today.
“Sir?” Peter tried again.
“Like I said.” Thorley hunched over a plastic-topped kitchen table, his white T-shirt barely touching the curved metal back of the lone chair. Peter imagined he’d be able to see the man’s bony spine through the shirt’s thin cotton.
Peter stood at the entryway to the kitchen area, since Thorley’s chair was the only place to sit other than a sorry-looking couch in this… rooming house, they used to call them. Probably a more politically correct name now. Kinder words wouldn’t erase the smoke-stained paint, the discolored patches on the threadbare carpeting, the matchbook shoved under one metal leg of the kitchen table.
Loser, Peter thought, then corrected himself. Client. Innocent till proven guilty.
“Like you said-what?” Peter had not been offered a seat on the couch, not necessarily a bad thing, so he waited, arms crossed, briefcase open on the floor, standing between the front door and the back window, pretending he was comfortable. Two steps would take him to Thorley. There was not enough air for the both of them. Peter had seen worse. He had to get his guy to talk, or this was going nowhere.
“Forget it,” Thorley said.
What bugged the hell out of him, it appeared there was more to Thorley than semi-squalor. Along one wall, in black frames and matted in white, a single line of photographs stretched from one corner to the other. Aligned precisely, not one corner tipping higher than any another. Each black-and-white was similar to the next, but different. Branches. Bare tree branches, some unmistakably ancient, gnarled and battered. Others delicately young, thin, fragile. No leaves, no buds, no flowers, only stark slashes of black, backlit against a cloudless sky.
“You take those?” Might as well try to understand the guy. Murderer? Or liar?
“What of it?”
“They’re good. You’re talented.” Peter had a thought. Not a good one. “Where’d you shoot them?” The Arboretum?
“Around,” Thorley said.
“The Arboretum?” He had to ask.
“Maybe.” Thorley flickered him a look. Then stared again at the table.
So much for conversation.
Peter pulled an accordion folder from his bag. This folder was still thin, not yet filled with the research and documentation he’d gather as the case went forward. If it went forward. Peter was used to recalcitrant clients, to combative clients, to those who didn’t understand he was the only thing that stood between them and a justice system that would as soon keep them in the slammer forever, tax dollars and the Constitution and actual guilt be damned. Had to admit, though, he wasn’t used to having them confess to cold-case murders. That made this interesting. Unusual.
“Like I said.” Thorley took another sip of coffee, then coughed, one miserable hack, clapping a wiry hand to his chest. His once-white T-shirt, ribbing around the arms and neck spent and shapeless, said BARDON’S GYM in fading orange lettering. That place had closed ten years ago, Peter knew, maybe longer. “I did it.”
“Did what?” Peter flipped though the folder, finding the pale blue onionskin he needed. “According to your parole records here, you have no priors before your armed robbery conviction in 1995. And after you got out in 2010-your second try at parole-you stayed clean. What’s the deal now with this sudden confession?”
Thorley drained the last from his paper cup, crumpled it, tossed it in the aluminum sink. He licked his lips, patted his chest, then his jeans pockets.
“You got any-?” he asked.
“Sorry,” Peter said. “Gave it up.” He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket, the alarm set to remind him of his meeting with Jane Ryland. For which he was now verging on late. Time was also running out, he predicted, for Elliot Sandoval. “Look. Thorley. Your sister called me. I’m here to help. You need to let me help you.”