Read The Truth of Yesterday Online
Authors: Josh Aterovis
“What do you want?”
“I want to talk to you, face to face. I promise you, I don't mean you any harm.”
“Who hired you? Why are you investigating Paul's death?”
“I was hired by a friend of Paul's, his ex-lover.”
“Why would he care?”
“He still cared for Paul. He was very hurt when he found out he'd been murdered, and even more so when he found out that the police weren't pursuing this case with the fervor he expected.”
Tom Jackson snorted. “They're hardly pursuing it at all.”
“That's why he hired me.”
“You think you know who did this?”
“I have suspicions.”
“And you think I can help?”
“I'm hoping so.”
“Ok. I'll meet you. But it has to be somewhere public. For all I know, you could be the killer and you're afraid I know something so you're coming after me too.”
“Is that why you didn't talk to the police? You were afraid?”
“Wouldn't you be in my position?”
“I probably would be. Where can we meet?”
“I live in
Annapolis
. Can you meet me there in about an hour? I can give you directions to a restaurant I know where we can talk privately.”
“I don't really know the area that well. I'm in
Arlington
now; how long would that take me to get to
Annapolis
?”
“An hour should be plenty of time. You just get on 50 and follow it until you see the exit. It's well marked.” He gave me directions to the restaurant and we disconnected. I started the car and set off for
Annapolis
. I sure was doing a lot of driving around for this case.
The drive was simple if not exactly interesting. While I drove, I tried to keep my mind busy with trivia about the capital of
United States
briefly. When I ran out of trivia, which didn't take long, I let my mind wander where it wanted. It slithered around various things-
Amalie
, Jake, Fenton Black,
Tom
Jackson-before finally settling on Paul. After seeing that picture of him, he'd suddenly become more real to me somehow. It was almost as if before I'd seen it he was just an abstract concept, a puzzle to unravel. He'd been Micah's
Ex
, the Escort, the Murder Victim. Now, he was simply a person. Someone who had loved and been loved.
Someone gone forever.
I had a sudden urge to cry, but fought off the tears. It wouldn't do to show up for my meeting with Tom Jackson with red-rimmed eyes and a case of the sniffles. It wouldn't be a very professional image.
I found the restaurant and parked in the tiny parking lot across the street. The restaurant was on the first floor of a small brick building, part of a block long stretch of two story brick edifices that could have easily dated back to the 19
th
Century. Farther along the street, I saw a couple antique stores, an art supply store, and a few more coffee shops and restaurants. It looked as if the second floors had been converted into apartments and I wondered if that was where Mr. Jackson lived. The wood trim on the buildings had been painted bright cheery colors and I thought it wouldn't be a bad place to live at all. The neighborhood had a bustling, cozy feel to it.
I walked in and looked around for a man sitting alone. It wasn't crowded and most of the people were there in pairs. I spotted one lone man sitting at a table off to one side. He was an attractive light-skinned black man in his early 30's, well-dressed with close-cropped hair and a clean-shaven face. I approached his table cautiously, unsure if this was the man I'd come to meet or not.
“Tom Jackson?” I asked in a low voice. He looked up and surprise registered on his face.
“Are you the detective?” he asked.
“Private Investigator.
My name is Killian Kendall.” I held out a hand for him to shake, which he did somewhat hesitantly.
“I expected-,” he began, but cut himself off.
“Someone older?”
I finished. “I get that a lot, but I can assure you, Mr. Jackson, I know what I'm doing.”
“Call me TJ,” he said. He had a soft, lyrical voice that sounded as if it would lend itself well to jazz. “I didn't mean to insult you. I realized as I was saying it that it was a stupid thing to say. I don't even know how old you are.”
“I'm almost as young as I look, but that's not important. I appreciate your talking to me.”
“It's the least I could do.”
“I don't want to take up a lot of your time, so I'm going to jump right in. You and Paul were dating?”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“We'd just celebrated our six month anniversary the week before
he
...before he was...” He stopped and swallowed several times, his eyes blinking rapidly.
His grief was painfully obvious; it rolled off of him like physical waves, washing over me and bringing those earlier tears back to the surface. I wondered why I could feel his pain so clearly and decided it must have just been because I was so tired. Before meeting him, I'd half wondered if my suspicions about Black could be wrong and the boyfriend might not be the killer. Having met him now, I no longer thought that. Every ounce of my intuition said he was innocent and had loved Paul very much. I hated to continue to dredge up these painful memories, but knew I had to.
“How did you meet?”
“We met last year. I teach music at a school in the city.”
“DC?”
“
Baltimore
. The school was holding a benefit concert and Paul was there with a client. He came up to me after the concert to tell me how wonderful he thought the concert was and to congratulate me. He was so sweet. We hit it off right away. We talked for a while, but when he left, that was it. I didn't know his name or anything. A few months later, we ran into each other at a jazz concert on the Mall in DC.” I smiled to myself about the jazz reference and my earlier guess. “He wasn't working that time and I was only there with a couple friends who wouldn't miss me at all, so we hung out for the rest of the night. That led to a few more dates and things just went from there.”
“You knew he was an escort?”
“Yes, Paul was very up-front about that right from the start.”
“And it didn't bother you at all?” I admit this question was more for me than from the standpoint of the case.
“Not really. It was his job; he had it before I met him. Who am I to judge him? He was a good person. I knew that instinctively from the first time I met him. That was all I needed to know.”
His words sunk into me like rain into parched ground. I sat quiet for so long TJ finally waved a hand in front of my face. “You still there?” he asked.
“Sorry,” I said, blushing. “My mind wandered for a second there. I didn't get much sleep last night.” I shook my head to clear it. “Were you planning a vacation with Paul?”
His eyes widened. “How'd you know about that?”
“Plane tickets for two were found in his safe, along with a few other things.”
“They were...” He stopped and took a deep breath. “They were for our honeymoon. We were planning to have a commitment ceremony. Paul surprised me with them on our anniversary.”
“Why all the secrecy?”
“The school I work for isn't the most liberal institution. It's a private school, religiously backed. They don't know I'm gay. Well, actually, a few people on the faculty know, but they are all very protective of me. The administration doesn't know and if I want to keep my job, I'd better keep it that way. I love my job, Mr. Kendall.”
“Call me Killian,” I said absently.
“Ok, Killian. You mentioned a few other things in the safe, do you mind if I ask what they
were?
”
“Not at all.
In fact, maybe you can help explain them. There was a bank book with regular deposits but no withdraws and some letters that didn't say who they were to.”
“The bank book is easy. We'd started a savings account for the two of us, as a safety net in case I lost my job. We were putting whatever we could spare into it as often as we could afford it. It was only in his name because I was too paranoid to open a joint account.”
“And the letters?”
He looked away.
“I think those letters were to Paul's killer,” I said softly. “If I'm right, then you could help me catch him. I need you to tell me everything you know about this, TJ. It could be really important.”
He drew in a shaky breath. “I told him to just leave it alone, but he couldn't. He was the type of person who couldn't stand to see injustice go unchallenged.”
“What was the injustice?”
“He found out some things about someone he knew.”
“TJ, you're going to have to be more specific. I already know all this.
How about if I make it easier on you.
I tell you what I suspect and you tell me if I'm right or wrong?”
He nodded jerkily.
“I suspect that Paul somehow found out that his boss Neal was really Fenton Black.”
“He'd known that for a while, after Black made the mistake of showing up at a society dinner that Paul was attending with a client. Black is an arrogant bastard. He walked right up to Paul and introduced himself. Paul recognized his voice right away, although he didn't let Black know.”
“Ok. So then, Paul maybe finds out about all the shady dealings Black was involved with and it eats at him.
Right?”
TJ nodded. “So he starts writing him those letters, trying to get him to...what? Here's where I get lost. What was Paul hoping to accomplish? He doesn't seem like the blackmailing type. What was he trying to do, get Black to do the right thing? Was he really that naïve?”
“He wasn't trying to blackmail him,” he snapped, then took a deep breath. “Sorry. In many ways, yes, Paul was that naïve. He was very idealistic. He had this view of the way he thought the world should be and expected everything to fit that way. Even after all he'd been through, with his family abandoning him and his lover leaving.”
“What did Black do when he got the letters?” I tried to ignore the reference to his lover leaving.
“He contacted Paul, told him to back off. Paul told him that he had saved copies of all the letters along with a file that described in great detail everything Paul had on him.”
“There was nothing like that in the safe. No files, nothing to even hint at who the letters were too.”
“That's because it was never in the safe. He kept it somewhere else, as a precaution.”
“Where?”
“I…I don't know.”