“‘The people’ should pay their mortgage.” The man pointed to the clapboard two-story with his cell phone. “Then ‘the cops’ wouldn’t have to ‘remove’ their possessions.”
Okay, so not a lawyer for the Sandovals. But at least this jerk wasn’t dialing.
“Are you with A &A? With the bank?” Might as well be direct.
“That’s not any of-”
“Vitucci! Callum!” The deputy appeared in the open front door, one hand on each side of the doorjamb as if to keep himself upright. He held the screen door open with his foot. His smirk had vanished. The two cops on the driveway alerted, inquiring.
“Huh? What’s up?” one asked.
“You getting this?” Jane whispered. She didn’t want to ruin TJ’s audio with her voice, but something was happening. Something the eviction squad hadn’t expected.
“Second floor.” The deputy pulled a radio from his belt pouch. Looked at it. Looked back at the cops. His shoulders sagged. “Better get in here.”
2
“Why would he confess if he didn’t do it?” Detective Jake Brogan peered through the smoky one-way glass at the guy slumped in the folding chair of Boston Police Department’s interrogation room E. What Jane would probably call “skeevy”-too-long hair scraggling over one ear, ratty jacket, black T-shirt, tired tan pants. Thin. Late thirties, at least, more like forty. How old would Gordon Thorley have been in 1994, when Carley Marie Schaefer was killed? Late teens, at most. Around the same age as Carley. “This guy Thorley just shows up here at HQ and insists he’s guilty? You ever seen that? Heard of that?”
“Let’s get some lunch. Ask questions later.” DeLuca jammed his empty paper coffee cup into the overflowing metal trash bin in the hall outside the interrogation room. “Sherrey will get all we need, give us his intake notes after. Could be a bird in the hand.”
“Not exactly ‘in the hand,’” Jake said. “If he’s a whack job. There’s also that old ‘innocent till proven guilty’ thing.”
Jake flipped through the manila case file, a disorganized jumble of flimsy-paged police records, scrawled judge’s orders, and blurry prison logs. Who was this Gordon Thorley, anyway? Seemed like no one-not the cops, not the DA’s office-had ever heard of him in connection with Carley Marie Schaefer. In connection with an armed robbery back in the 1990s, sure; in connection with a chunk of prison time, sure. He’d been out on parole almost five years now. Record since then looked clean.
“Mr. Thorley?” Investigator Branford “Bing” Sherrey’s voice crackled over the speaker. “Let’s do this one more time. Start with Carley Marie Schaefer. What was your relationship with her? Why’d you come forward now? Why not before?”
The man picked up the can of diet ginger ale from the table in front of him. He examined the label, then, from the looks of it, slugged down the whole thing. He paused, swallowing. Then shrugged. “I get why you don’t believe me. I know I should have owned up. But I was just a-okay. Again. Carley and me, we met in high school. We… had a thing. We kept it secret. I was older. She lived with her parents, out in Attleboro. Then she tried to break it off. I didn’t want that. We went to our special place in the…”
“Whack job,” D said. “Why do you want to hear this again?”
“Maybe it’s true,” Jake said. “And we’ll clear this case. Finally. My grandfather was still on the job when Carley Marie was killed. I was maybe fourteen. Boston went crazy, I still remember it. Girl’s body discovered by a family on a picnic. The Lilac Sunday killer.” Jake blew out a breath, picturing those thick black headlines in the Register and the Record. “Grandpa would talk about it, nights. It was a huge deal. Weighed on him. How Carley’s family was so distraught. He ‘went to his grave,’ Grandma Brogan still says, regretting his squad of murder cops never caught the Lilac Sunday killer.”
“You think this is him?” D scratched his nose, looked unconvinced.
“Lilac Sunday’s only a week away. We could do with a big solve,” Jake said. “Even one that falls into our laps.”
Behind the window, Thorley was talking with his hands, illustrating the heavy coil of rope he’d stashed in the trunk of his green Celica, the circumference of the tree trunk in Boston’s Arnold Arboretum, the tight twist of the knots he’d made to hold Carley Schaefer in place. Thorley jabbed the heel of his palm toward the window. Jake flinched. Carley’s neck had been snapped. Huh. Thorley seemed like too much of a wimp for that.
“And gimme a break, D,” Jake added. “If we’re getting this guy’s case, we need to hear his story. Sucks that the Supe didn’t call us till now. We should have been doing the questioning. Not Bing.”
“Won’t matter. The guy’s prolly a wannabe. A nut.” DeLuca shook his head. “It’s like, he read some old newspapers or whatever and now he’s making himself into a scary killer. He wants a TV movie, who knows. Lifetime presents the Lilac Sunday Killer. Crap. We’re supposed to spend time on this sucker when Homicide’s working on three open cases? New ones?”
Jake stared through the glass. Gordon Thorley-hands now clasped on the pitted metal table, looked straight ahead, eyes not quite focused. Third time through the Carley Marie story, Jake caught the same inflection, the same word choice. Had Thorley practiced? Contemplated his confession so often that it set in stone?
“It’s as if he’s been told what to say.” Jake closed his file, took out his cell phone.
DeLuca rolled his eyes. Pointed to Thorley. “Oh, yeah. Why didn’t I think of that? This is why I’m proud to be your partner. Basking in the glory.”
“Stuff it, D.” Jake tried to talk and dial his cell at the same time. D was a good guy and a solid partner, but like the entire Homicide squad, overworked and under-successful. Boston had too many murders, not enough arrests. Only a fourth-year detective, Jake was low man in seniority, which meant high man on the Supe’s dreaded blame list. It didn’t help to be grandson of a former police commissioner. Jake’s blue-line “legacy” admittedly provided a leg up at entry level, but not job security or acceptance by his colleagues. D, ten years his senior, and in the “from the ranks” club, didn’t always feel the pressure to go the extra mile. If D could close a case, faster was better. Jake still thought “right” was better.
He held up a palm, putting his partner on hold so he could hear his phone call. “Hello? This is Jake Brogan, Boston Police. Not an emergency, but I need talk to Dr. Nathaniel Frasca. He around? Yes, I’ll hang on.”
“Who’s that?” DeLuca narrowed his eyes. “Doctor who?”
“You’ll see,” Jake said. “And maybe I’ll let you bask in the glory.”
3
“Go. Go. Get closer.” Jane almost pushed TJ forward, guiding him across the short driveway and toward the postage-stamp front porch. The Boston cops had dashed inside, radios crackling. Suit guy had slammed himself into the front seat of his fancy Lexus, punching buttons on his cell phone the whole way. “You’re rolling, right?”
“On it,” TJ said. He held the camera steady, targeting the door, but glanced over at her. “And I got this, you know, Ryland? Chill. I’m white-balanced, I got batteries, I’m up on sound. You don’t have to keep checking.”
“Sorry,” she said. “Ignore me.”
Would she ever lose her fear of failure? Her mom used to tease her-probably half tease, half worry-each time Jane predicted certain disaster. She’d fail the test, miss the cut, come in second, lose the story. It never happened. Hardly ever. Maybe fear was good. Maybe fear’s what kept her in the game.