Chapter Twenty-three
C
arter stared at the phone after he hung up. If he was wrong about Nicki, or if she was wrong about Brad, he'd just made himself an accessory to murder. Worse, he'd just granted tacit approval for his daughter to remain in the company of a convicted killer.
What the hell was he thinking?
It occurred to him as he sat in his car contemplating his own stupidity that he'd inadvertently started a clock for everyone involved. He needed to find this kid in the red shirt, and he'd end up doing it alone. Nicki was dead-on about the mind-set of cops. They already knew who their suspects were, and whatever Carter told them would be discounted as the frantic rantings of a worried father.
He jumped a foot as the front passenger door opened. Before he could say a word, the female deputy he'd seen inside the Quik Mart slid into the seat next to him and closed the door. She smelled of wet hair. “Couple days of this and we'll have to build an ark,” she said. When she saw the look of confusion in Carter's face, she extended her hand. “Darla Sweet. We met inside.”
A little stunned, he took her hand. “I remember,” he said. “Can I help you?”
“I was watching you through the window,” she said, nodding to the front of the store. “That was a long chat. You looked pretty animated. I presume you were talking to your daughter?”
Carter tried his best to look unfazed, but he didn't think he pulled it off. “If I were, it would be none of your business,” he said. “Attorney-client privilege.”
“That's a good one,” Darla said. “I was thinking misprision of a felony.”
Carter felt trapped. He didn't know what to say, and his silence told the deputy that she was correct.
Darla let him off the hook. “If you did speak to her, I hope that you had the good sense to advise her to turn herself in.”
“It wouldn't be that simple,” he said. “She's innocent.”
“Evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.”
Carter looked past the deputy and saw through the front windows of the Quik Mart that the crime scene technicians were still bustling. “You're not searching for exculpatory evidence,” he said. “I wouldn't expect you to find it.”
She didn't bite. “Evidence is evidence. Prosecution and defense have equal access.”
Carter allowed himself a bitter chuckle. “I
am
a prosecutor, Deputy. I know better. The good news is, I can take your case apart in court.”
“All the more reason for you to tell her to come on in,” Darla observed.
“You mean if I speak to her?”
“Of course. Let her stand trial and humiliate us all.”
Carter had learned a long time ago to trust his instincts about people, and he liked something about Deputy Sweet. She had the look of an idealist. On a different day, he'd have called it naïveté, but not on a day when he needed her help. “Suppose I did talk to her,” he said. “Hypothetically, of course, and suppose she told me that she and her friend only witnessed the killing, and tried to help the victim after he was shot? Suppose all those fingerprints were as a result of that?”
“Then I think that she'd need to step up and say so.”
Carter wondered how much he should share with her. “Like I said, it's not that simple. Not for Nicki. I don't give a shit about the guy she's with. If I had spoken with her, I think she would have said that the robbery was committed by someone else, a man wearing a red jersey of some sort. A sports jersey. I think she might tell you that Brad Wardâ”
“Dougherty.”
“Whatever. I'm guessing that she might tell you that he actually tried to stop the robbery, but couldn't before shots were fired. She might tell you that given Brad's record, and her desire to stay on the run, they'd panicked and left the scene only after they'd seen that the victim was already dead.”
“That would be after they'd disarmed Ben Maestri.”
“Who approached them with a gun and threatened to shoot.”
Darla said, “We keep coming back to the strong argument in favor of them turning themselves in and letting the justice system grind its gears. It is a pretty good system, you know.”
“Not for my daughter, it's not. In the amount of time it would take for the case to come to trial, she'd already be dead. That's not how I want her to spend her last months.”
Darla looked confused. “Mr. Janssen, prison is not an easy place, but it is certainly survivable.”
“It's not the prison,” Carter said. “She's sick.” He explained the nature of the disease. “I need to find the exculpatory evidence before you arrest her. I need to find the
real
bad guy. And you need to keep your crime scene open and operating until I do.”
Darla seemed moved by Carter's predicament. “Don't you understand how dangerous it is out there for her if she doesn't turn herself in? The whole state of North Carolina is on the lookout for a pair of murderers. That's a lot of guns.”
“Of course I know that.” Christ, how could she think that he
didn't
know that? “That means my clock is ticking. My question to you is, are you going to help, or am I going to go this alone?”
Darla recoiled. “We've done our investigation. I don't see howâ”
“I don't see how it could hurt to take a look at the other side of the equation,” he interrupted. “Assume for the sake of argument that I'm right. You can prevent a terrible miscarriage of justice. If I'm wrong, you might actually strengthen your case. It's a win-win.”
Darla smiled as if he'd just told a joke. “I'll run it by the sheriff and see what he thinks.”
It wasn't what Carter wanted to hear. “You really think there's a chance that he might go along with that?” he asked. The sheriff was a hard-ass through and through. He wouldn't take kindly to being second-guessed.
Darla gave an incredulous chuckle. “What, are you suggesting that I open up a separate investigation without telling him?”
“It's not a separate investigation,” Carter said. “It's a different angle on the
same
investigation.”
Darla looked at him as if he'd suggested that the earth was flat. “You're talking career suicide,” she said. “The sheriff's very excited about closing this case. He's got elections coming up soon.”
“So, to hell with justice?”
Darla didn't sniff the bait. “Justice and windmill jousting are two entirely different things.”
Carter felt his face flush. “You heard the old man. What's his name, Ben? You heard him swear that he put a tape in the machine.”
“Ben Maestri is a drunk,” she said. “He's been a drunk for as long as anyone can remember.”
“Yet, he's the eyewitness on whom you want to hang your entire case,” Carter said. “You can't have it both ways.”
“So, what are you suggesting happened to the tape?”
“You tell me,” Carter said. “Let's find out. It's not wrong, is it, to actually
test
the theory that you hold so dear?”
Darla scowled. She seemed to be debating whether or not to say what was on her mind.
“Do you want me to ask him?” Carter pressed.
She said, “If you had talked to your daughterâ”
“Nicolette,” Carter said quickly. It was always best to put a name on a suspect. Even better when the suspect was young. “She prefers Nicki.”
“If you had talked to Nicki and she had offered the details you passed along, I confess that I would be intrigued. Frankly, between you and me, the fingerprints in the blood have been troubling me.”
Carter waited for it.
Darla watched the investigators as she spoke. “Why would they check his pulse if they were the shooters? Why would they care? You pull the trigger, somebody dies. It's the way it works.”
Carter allowed himself a smile. “Deputy Sweet, I think I might like you after all.”
“Don't,” Darla snapped. “I don't give a shit about your daughter. I'd arrest her in a heartbeat. And I'd sure as hell take down her boyfriend.”
“I already told you I don't care about him.”
“And I don't care that you don't care.”
He acknowledged her with a nod.
“And then there's the gun itself,” Darla went on.
“You've got the murder weapon?”
“We think so. It's the right caliber, but we have to do the ballistics tests to be sure. Problem is, there are no prints and there are no bullets. It was freshly fired, but with evidence of only one bullet expended.”
Carter's eyes narrowed as he tried to see where she was going. “What are you saying?”
For the first time Darla seemed sympathetic. “I don't think the shooter intended to shoot.”
Carter didn't understand.
“The weapon we recovered is a Glock,” she explained. “I was thinkingâ”
He saw the answer for himself. “There was a round in the chamber,” Carter said, finishing the thought for her. The Glock was respected the world over as a weapon for law enforcers, but it had a well-known downside in the hands of amateurs: it remained forever cocked. Even after the magazine was dropped out of the grip, a bullet remained in the chamber, and from there, it was a matter of a slight trigger pull and the thing would fire.
“Exactly,” Darla said. She seemed impressed that he could catch on so fast. “I figure he got a little anxious and squeezed too hard.”
“Or, he was tackled by an innocent bystander,” Carter offered.
“One who happened to be wanted for murder in Michigan?”
Carter let her connect her own dots.
“It's a hell of a coincidence,” Darla said. “But it holds up.”
“It's a hell of a lot more believable than a shooter who pulls off his gloves to check a pulse,” Carter said. “And what about those tipped-over racks and stuff in front of the counter? What are your investigators hypothesizing about that?”
“Ben said that they were already tipped over when he came out.”
Carter's stomach tightened. Eyewitness testimony was hard as hell to beat in court. “Did Ben actually
say
that he saw Nicki and Brad shoot the boy? I mean, did he ever say something as direct as, âI saw them pull the trigger'?”
Darla started to answer then stopped herself. “Actually, no. In fact, he said he was in the back room when the shots were fired.”
“
Shot,
” Carter corrected. “Singular. So that adds even more credence to Nicki's version of events.”
“No, it doesn't,” Darla said. “Gives you a barrelful of reasonable doubt, but it's non-data; doesn't support your theory any more than it supports ours.”
Carter felt his frustration mount. “
Justice,
Deputy. It's not your theory versus mine. It's about
justice
.”
“Sounds to me like it's about protecting your daughter,” Darla said. The words might have sounded harsh coming from someone else, but from her, they sounded nearly sympathetic.
The rain continued to pound. “Fair enough,” he said, “so long as you remember that she's an innocent.”
“Despite the company she keeps.”
Carter did not respond. What could he say?
“Maybe we could speak with Ben again,” Darla mused. “We sent him home, but I have his address.”
Carter felt something jump inside of him as he realized that he might have an ally here. “I'd like to come along.”
Darla scowled. Clearly, it was as inappropriate in Essex, North Carolina, as it would have been in Pitcairn County, New York. “I'll drive,” she said.
* * *
Nicki had never seen so much rain. It fell in torrents, flooding the parking lot and transforming the afternoon into perpetual dusk. As they sat waiting in the Sebring, the radio informed them that a developing low pressure system was stalled off the Carolina coast. If the winds picked up another ten miles an hour, the unnamed tropical depression would become Tropical Storm Carlena.
“Are you going to tell me what we're up to?” Nicki asked.
“Not yet. Soon.” They'd been watching the cars in the parking lot for ten minutes. Nicki had figured that Brad planned to hot-wire one of the diners' vehicles, but he'd ruled that out on the outset. “We wouldn't get a half mile before someone reported it,” he'd said.
When she pressed for more, he ignored her. Now they sat in silence. It was all Nicki could do to keep her eyes open.
When a well-traveled Ford Bronco pulled into the parking lot on the video store side, Brad sat up straighter in his seat. “Okay,” he said. “I think this one might be it.”
Nicki pulled herself closer to the windshield to see through the distortion of the cascading water. She watched as a woman and a boy exited the truck. Clearly the grandmother, the woman opened an umbrella in a vain attempt to deflect the pelting rain, while the boy basked in the downpour and made a point of stomping in every puddle.
“This is it,” Brad said. “Are you ready?”
Before she could even open her mouth to respond, he'd already opened his door.
* * *
At Gramma's insistence, Scotty Boyd pulled off his sneakers and socks and left them outside the door of the video store. It was a compromise to not being allowed to enter at all. Good boys didn't soak themselves in rain puddles.
Come to think of it, good boys didn't do any of the things that Scotty liked to do. They didn't drink milk out of the carton, they didn't watch cartoons, they didn't piss in the grass, and they didn't shoot at anthills with BB guns. And that was just today. What good boys did do was behave themselves twenty-four hours a day without ever complaining.